BR 125 
.B7 
Copy 1 



TREND OF THE AGES, 



JOHN tf, BSYET, DJ 



"M 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

Bfcias 

Chap Copyrights 

Shelf sQ-T. 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE 
TREND OF THE AGES. 



BY 

JOHN H.' BOYET, D.D., 

Author of "Christian Science Exposed,'* 
and "Church Government." 



IiOTJISVIKLE, KY. 
BAPTIST BOOK CONCERN. 

1900. 



} 



97033 



L ibrwry of Congress 

Co*E8 Received 
DEC 31 1900 

', ~. Copyright entry 

SECOND COPY 

Ueiiwsd to 

OHDEK DIVISION 

JAN 4 19Q1 






Copyright, 1900, 

Br JOHN H. BOYET, D.D., 

LOUISVILLE, ky. 



INSTEAD OP A PREFACE. 



Adequate causation is the explanation of all 
phenomena. Why should there be an intermin- 
able war of words in the mere technology of 
religion? In Him we live and move and have 
our earthly being, for, He giveth life and breath 
and all things. 

Religion is inwrought in the subjective and 
constitutional law of our moral being. The 
Christ character is vital and remedial wherever 
it appears in human history or is felt in human 
experience. 

The natural and the supernatural are one. 
The miraculous and the non-miraculous are only 
terms in which we speak of the usual and the 
unusual in nature. Nature and grace are one, 
and differ only in the manifest form of the divine 
imminence. It is only the measure of intelligence 
necessarily applied in the emergency. 

Religion is not the exceptional in life. Relig- 
ion is life. Life is not a thing apart from the 
ordinary in man. Religion is the ordinary in 
man. Vice is not the absence of religion, but 
that which is vicious in the psycho -physical life 
of a being who cannot escape the religious aspect 



iv Instead of a Preface, 

of life impinged upon material form. The truth, 
therefore, is one whether expressed in terms of 
theology or of biology. The struggle is be- 
tween mind and matter, between life and death. 
The flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit 
against the flesh. 

Religious experience is incidental to the strug- 
gle going on in the evolution of time, and his- 
tory records the facts of human experience. 
God is in his world, and the record of all good 
is accredited to him in the annals of all human 
experience. All good is evidence of divine im- 
minence, and he is as apparent in the usual as 
the unusual. 

The character of God is not manifest in the 
mysteries, but in the beneficent. The beneficence 
of the Christ character in human experience is 
an evidence of the life more abundant; and it 
matters little whether it is called supernatural, 
or the natural in greater measure. 

The life more abundant was at high tide in 
Jesus of Nazareth, and manifested itself in aton- 
ing measure. That which was necessary in the 
trend of the ages was expressed in terms of law, 
and that which met these demands expressed 
itself in legal terms. 

In moments of high psychic communion with 
the life more abundant, the prophets foreshad- 
owed its fixed expression in the character of the 



Instead of a Preface. V 

Nazarene, and in Him we have the perfect type 
of what shall be in the golden age to come. 
This is the truth as it is in Jesus Christ, who 
said: "I am the way, the truth, and the life." 
The truth of Christian dogma is one with the 
truth in Christ. The truth as it is, and the 
truth as it is in Christ, differ only in the fullness 
of expression. The truth can never be fully ex- 
pressed in terms of theology nor of biology. 
We look for a new heaven and a new earth 
wherein dwelleth righteousness. When these 
shall appear in the consummation of the ages, 
the way, the truth, and the life shall be one in 
essence and expression. The pulpit, the labo- 
ratory and the spade are instruments of the Holy 
Spirit in confirming unto us the prophecy of the 
redemption of life in man. Only in different 
tongues are they conveying the same divine 
thought to humanity, and thus uniting in one 
cosmothetic movement. The unknown is com- 
ing nearer, and earth shall soon hear in every 
sound and see in all phenomena the same story 
of a world redeemed. 

In the progress of this movement this little 
book is dedicated to the Love Slaves of The Christ. 

John H. Boyet. 



THE TREND OF THE AGES. 



CHAPTER I. 

MIRACLE AND DEVELOPMENT. 

"When the morning stars sang together and all the 
sons of God shouted for joy." 

Through time the Christ is marching. History- 
is but the record of a great mind-movement upon 
physical organism. In mid- ages stands the cross, 
and we are far down the march of time as it is 
marked by the world incidents of the past. The 
terminal inflorescence of the earthly divine man- 
ifestation makes haste now, and soon the social 
Christ flower will appear in its unfading bloom. 
Enough of its beauty already appears to help us 
much in our study of the divine anthotaxis. 

Really the flower is one, and in its expansion 
it is centrifugal, or from center to circumfer- 
ence. And when it has, in its fragrant beauty, 
described the circumference of earth and time 
it will have but one meaning and one charm. 
"Christ is all and all." 

What a day of the Lord Almighty. What a 
splendid scene to the eyes of the heavenly hosts 
when Adamic life took form from the dust of the 



Miracle and Development. 7 

ground and stood forth a complete miracle. Six 
successive periods had removed the earth's gar- 
ment of cloud and its swaddling band of thick 
darkness, and the fixing of the sun, moon and 
stars in the heaven had prepared the earth for 
the dwelling of man. Somewhere in Asia, per- 
haps where the flowers were already blooming 
along the banks of the Euphrates and while the 
new-made birds were singing their morning song 
of gladness, the morning stars and the sons of 
God joined in the first glad vocal prophecy of a 
subdued world. 

In man's primitive form they caught the first 
glimpse of a far-away and ultimate purpose as 
from his face beamed the evidences of psychic 
consciousness and intelligent action. Before 
their eyes hung the mists of unfolding centuries, 
but the light of prophetic virtue shined upon the 
pages of far-off time; and, instinct with the emo- 
tions of psychic triumph, they sang earth's pre- 
lude in the metre of a world redeemed. 

In this first man there was the possibility of 
the fall, and in his complex being there was 
foreshadowed all the passions of malice and 
hate with which to channel the earth for a river 
of blood. 

Beneath the outward form of beauty was 
the heart-beat which when poisoned by a sin- 
gle act of disobedience was to drive the engines 



8 The Trend of the Ages. 

of destruction through long ages holding the 
problems of human suffering and woe. And yet 
there was a miracle. Material form stood erect, 
instinct with intelligence and life, and pro- 
claimed the final triumph of mind over all the 
material issues involved. Thousands, and even 
millions, may fall in the wreck of ages and gen- 
erations, till the mastery of mind in and over 
matter is complete, but this final triumph was 
the prophecy of man's psychophysical being. 

He who by arbitrary miracle gave to human 
mind and will its cosmogonal existence and 
abode had an ultimate purpose, and foresaw the 
trend of the ages, and his plan comprehended the 
end from the beginning. To him who is from 
everlasting to everlasting the centuries are but 
as an incident and a thousand years as but 
a day. His wisdom is manifold and his plan is 
multiform. He is in his works and his power is 
beyond the emergencies and contingencies of all 
time. The fall was not the obliteration of the 
soul upon which the divine might impinge as the 
life of the soul had done upon material form. 
The fact that that which is born of the Spirit is 
Spirit was definitely fixed in the mind of God, 
and the creation of man was only the miraculous 
beginning of a great spiritual movement upon 
the material forces of the earth which he had 
made. 



Miracle and Development. 9 

The souls of men were made conscious of this 
movement almost from the beginning, and it im- 
parted to earth its hope of final regeneration. 
Along the trend of the ages the emotions of 
earth's millions produced by faith and hope have 
broken forth in a song which answers back to 
the time when the morning stars sang together 
and all the sons of God shouted for joy; and, 
thus, the supernatural proclaims the fulfillment 
of the world's first prophecy in miracle. 

The creation of a human soul involved the 
human possibilities of the visible manifestation 
of the kingdom of heaven, and in the nature of 
that soul was projected a great spiritual move- 
ment upon the forces of nature which God in- 
wrought in the creation of the world of material 
and animal being. In the history of that day we 
read the prophecy of the incarnation of the di- 
vine life of the Christ, in whom was to be sub- 
jected all the psychic and cosmic forces of 
psychophysical humanity to the Christ charac- 
ter. In the history of that incarnation we read 
the prophecy of another incarnation of the 
Christ life in all the relations of human lives, 
while in the character of the first incarnation we 
read the prophecy of what the last shall be. 

Thus it will be seen that by an involution as 
well as an evolution the Father's world govern- 
ment has been dispensational, and it suggests 



10 The Trend of the Ages. 

the necessity of different methods and processes 
in different ages of the world. 

Man's privilege and duty is not to form a con- 
ception of what God is, and therefore what he 
must have done before he made the world, but, 
rather to permit a conception of his multiform 
plan and manifold wisdom from what he is doing 
in the world. Thus we shall see him in his 
works and in his word. We will no longer vainly 
read the Bible in the light of our own feeble con- 
ception of God or the differentiated conceptions 
of his attributes. We will therefore cease to fix 
him apart from the world by some immutable 
law of his being vainly imagined by us, and by 
that law fixing all things in fate. "Theology" 
will become less important to us and "Bibliol- 
atry" will become paramount in reading the 
signs of our times. Thus we will study the law 
and the prophets till in the evolutions of time 
we shall identify the first incarnation of the 
Christ. 

Then in the light of his character we shall 
read the prophecy of the future. Thus we shall 
hardly fail to feel the power of his Spirit and 
catch his meaning when he says, "If ye continue 
in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; 
and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall 
make you free." 

The difference between mere variety and that 



Miracle and Development 11 

of a distinct species is as clearly defined in the 
moral world as in the vegetable or animal king- 
dom. In the moral trend of the ages there were 
no new species appearing from the time the 
morning stars sang together, till the angels sang 
to the shepherds by night in the fields near 
Bethlehem, the city of David. 

Along the history of long centuries we see no 
distinct miracle of this kind. But in the devel- 
opment of God's multiform plan we see marked 
evidences of the presence of manifold wisdom 
and supernatural power in the production of dis- 
tinct varieties of the same species. These were 
epochal in character and marked the beginning 
and close of sub-dispensational eras. The sec- 
ond distinct world-era began with the flood, 
when all that was best in the psychic nature of 
a fallen race manifested itself in one family. 
The third world-era began with the destruction 
of the Tower of Babel, when God made of one 
blood, all nations to dwell on all the face of the 
earth. The fourth world-era began when God 
made covenant with Abraham that in his seed 
all families of the earth should be blessed. 
What is called by the naturalist or scientist the 
conservation of law, was nothing less than the 
supernatural Christ evolving what was possible 
in the wreck of a fallen image and treasuring it 
up in a narrow compass to scatter it abroad in a 



12 The Trend of the Ages. 

new era until the soil should be ready for his 
miraculous and visible appearance in the begin- 
ning of a new dispensation. Here the new spe- 
cies appeared in whom men were to be new 
creatures in Christ Jesus, by a new birth from 
above. This was the mystery hidden from other 
ages, but now made known by his holy apostles 
and prophets. The explanation of this mystery 
shows how it was involved in the era beginning 
with Abraham and evolved in the development 
of an hundred and forty and four thousand of 
the seed of Abraham whose psychic nature was 
susceptible to the spirit of inspiration and rev- 
elation; and who, in the fullness of the dispen- 
sation of times (eras) were recognized as the 
church of first-borns and constituted the Bride 
of the Christ. 

The preservation of the divine character in 
Christ's earthly life was the conservation of the 
personal divine life in the human soul and form 
of the Son of Mary, and thus, in the ascension 
and enthronement of that soul and form, re- 
deemed and sanctified humanity impinged upon 
the divine government to give the world a dis- 
pensation of free grace. 

Thus in human form he obtained the promise 
of the Father and shed forth on the day of Pen- 
tecost the Holy Spirit to begin the reincarnation 
of the Christ in the social relations of human 



Miracle and Development. 13 

life. On that day was celebrated, on Mount 
Zion, in Jerusalem, the marriage of the hundred 
and forty and four thousand of the seed of Abra- 
ham to the offspring of David through the eter- 
nal spirit. 

Thus the age of wedlock began; and "The 
Spirit and the Bride say, come, and let him that 
heareth say, come, and let him that is athirst 
come, and whosoever will, let him take of the 
water of life freely." 

The miracle of Christ's birth, life, death, res- 
urrection, ascension, enthronement and descent 
upon his bride on the day of Pentecost is one, 
varying only in visible form and marking the 
close of one and the beginning of another dis- 
pensation in the great spiritual movement upon 
the natural forces of this world. It involves the 
possibilities of our dispensation as the miracle 
of the first Adam involved the possibilities of 
the first. 

Nowhere is it indicated that all the minor de- 
tails of human experience which are effected by 
causes more or less remote, nor even the salva- 
tion or loss of all persons, were fixed by divine 
decree, nor that they were even considered as 
necessarily involved in the carrying forward of 
a predetermined purpose. 

But all of God ? s works were known to him 
from the beginning and the end of each dispen- 



14 The Trend of the Ages, 

sation was certain. That which is effected by- 
remote causes may be or seem to be, in an his- 
torical sense, incidental to the progress of a 
divine movement, and still in no sense reflect the 
mind or character of the divine being. They 
are explainable upon the hypothesis of another 
being, and the Bible tells us who he is. 

The entrance of Satan by invasion into the 
physical appetites and desires of man's psycho- 
physical being vitiated his moral character and 
affected his attitude towards God. This mani- 
fests itself in the individual and imperils the 
soul in the gloom of a lost race. 

Humanity was lost in Adam, and the second 
Adam came to save humanity. His plan inci- 
dentally and necessarily saved the souls of an 
hundred and forty and four thousand Jews, 
while the work of the Devil, incidentally, but 
not necessarily, results in the loss of millions. 

If we may think of an alternative, and it is not 
clear that we may not, we may believe that had 
not the race have fallen in Adam, perfect purity 
would have been maintained in all the relations 
of human beings. In such a case the creation 
of a human soul would have been a complete 
prophecy, in itself, of the final and complete 
triumph of mind over matter. 

There would therefore have been a necessity 
for only one incarnation and manifestation of 



Miracle and Development 15 

the Christ. This would have certainly come in 
the material and social relations of this world, as 
it certainly will come, since he has once come in 
the flesh and put away sin by the sacrifice of 
himself. 

The new species appeared in the second Adam. 
The Spirit of God breathed upon the face of the 
deep and prepared the earth for the abode of the 
first Adam, and then God created him by distinct 
miracle. 

The same Spirit breathed upon the abyss of 
man's fallen nature till it was ready for the sec- 
ond distinct miracle, and then xhe second Adam 
was conceived in the womb by the Lord God Al- 
mighty. Christians are of this species, and 
some day will rise in character and type to 
the measure of the fullness of the stature of 
Christ. 



16 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER II. 

PREDESTINATION IN THE TREND OF THE AGES. 

Since the sacred Scriptures are to be regarded 
as authority touching the religion of rational be- 
ings their harmony and consistency must be 
maintained. It is not necessary to show that 
unconditional election and predestination as a 
distinct proposition is inconsistent with the 
moral accountability and consequent free agency 
of man. As separate and distinct propositions 
they are at war with each other and can never 
be harmonized. One deals with man in the most 
arbitrary manner as to his origin, conduct and 
destiny, while the other takes account of his in- 
telligence and seeks to govern with beneficent 
limitations. To suggest both as the plan of 
governing the same people at the same time and 
under the same circumstances is to forfeit all 
claim of intelligent authority. No sane man can 
admit the divinity of such a suggestion. 

The right of government in either form may 
be admitted, but the possibility of both at the 
same time with the same people is out of the 
question. The human mind is incapable of such 
an admission. On this account Christians with 



Predestination in the Trend of the Ages. 17 

common loyalty to the Bible have warred with 
each other; one party practically denying the 
doctrine of predestination and unconditional 
election, and the other practically denying the 
doctrine of man's personal accountability. Each 
party have been compelled to admit that there 
were things in the Bible which they could not 
understand. Not that the language in which 
these things are set out is incomprehensible, but 
because the things set out seemed to contradict 
other things which they were sure the Bible 
taught. Is human reason to surrender at this 
point? I say it is not. There is a point where 
human reason must surrender, but it is not 
where the Bible is surrendered as a revelation 
from God to man. 

Some things are hard to be understood because 
of our attitude towards them, but if they are in 
the Bible we ought to be willing to change our 
attitude in order to understand them. But if 
predestination and man's free agency are both 
taught in the Bible, how is an honest man to 
change his attitude towards one without chang- 
ing his attitude towards the other? If he ignores 
the one because he holds to the other, he can, if 
he regards them as distinct and unrelated prop- 
ositions, only take kindly to one while propor- 
tionately abandoning the other. If they are 
both taught in the Bible, one of two things is 



18 The Trend of the Ages. 

true. Either the Bible has no claims upon 
rational beings or else the two doctrinal propo- 
sitions are relative to each other. The relation 
of the one to the other can never be found in the 
government of the same people at the same 
time, because one suggests a government radi- 
cally different from the other. 

Every student of the Bible and of the human 
race must recognize that law and order have 
been a development so far as this world is con- 
cerned, and that this development has a compre- 
hensive history. In the making of this history 
is found the relation of one form of government 
to another as one stage of development is neces- 
sary to another in the general advancement 
towards God's ultimate purpose. Thus it may be 
seen that doctrinal propositions which seem to 
be essentially in violent conflict with each other 
when applied to the same people, time and cir- 
cumstances may still be in perfect harmony when 
viewed in their historical relation. 

Predestination is not merely a formulated doc- 
trinal statement without a history. It is not the 
analysis of a divine attribute, but an inspired 
historical statement of what God has done. 
History never exactly repeats itself in the prog- 
ress of development. Things are similarly 
related when seen in the light of historical de- 
velopment towards a great end, but until the end 



Predestination in the Trend of the Ages. 19 

of development is reached the government under 
which the development is carried forward is ever 
changing in form. This is the history of pre- 
destination; and it is necessarily so. When the 
act of predestinating a thing has accomplished 
the purpose of predestination, the thing pur- 
posed takes the place of direct and arbitrary 
predestination. Thus it appears in history that 
from the beginning things are becoming less 
and less miraculous, and thus it will continue 
until all things will naturally wear the yoke of 
a divinely developed government. Then that 
government will take the place of every pre- 
destinated means for its development. 

The Bible simply reveals the facts which were 
necessary in God's governmental control towards 
the end purposed in the beginning. All benefi- 
cent government, though necessarily arbitrary 
in the beginning, seeks, through the process of 
development, the emancipation of the human 
mind and will. In the process of development 
some things are necessarily predetermined, while 
other things are purposed indirectly through 
the means directly and arbitrarily predestinated. 
Behind every free government, guaranteeing the 
right of personal choice, there has been the use 
of direct, arbitrary and predetermined author- 
ity. And in the front of every divine movement 
of this kind the beneficence of divine govern- 



20 The Trend of the Ages. 

ment manifests itself in the right of personal 
free choice. The right of personal choice is the 
thing purposed, and the thing which makes it 
possible is the thing predetermined. When the 
right of choice, therefore, is established, it 
necessarily displaces those things which were 
formerly predestinated, but are now the subjects 
of free choice. 

The trouble between religious factions has 
been in their failure to see that the relation 
which predestination sustains to the right and 
power of personal free choice, is an historical 
one. The unalterable purpose of God is, and 
has been, so far as we know the history of his 
dealings with men, that man should ultimately 
possess the right in himself to choose that which 
is good for him. What he has directly and arbi- 
trarily predestinated as a means to this end must 
of necessity in the development of this ultimate 
purpose, give place to the thing purposed. Thus 
it is that while predestination and personal ac- 
countability, while thought of as doctrinal prop- 
ositions applied contemporaneously, are in deadly 
conflict with each other and antagonizing the 
divine claims of the Bible over human reason, 
they are, when viewed in the light of an his- 
torical necessity, in perfect harmony. The end 
clearly justifies the means in this case, and not 
only satisfies the enlightened mind that the Bible 



Predestination in the Trend of the Ages. 21 

is the book of God, but inspires the heart also 
to praise him for his wonderful wisdom and 
goodness manifest to the children of men. 

The necessity for having predestinated some 
men to eternal life must appear at a moment's 
thought. If ever the Gospel was to become the 
power of God unto salvation to every one that 
believeth, the way must be prepared for it. 
Some men must be arbitrarily chosen, and, pre- 
pared in kind, for its introduction. The king- 
dom of God must be harmonious in the means of 
its introduction. Aliens cannot be used in estab- 
lishing its principles, which are foreign to earth's 
population. The predestinating act by which 
men were chosen must be practical as well as 
arbitrary. The act of predestinating and choos- 
ing them, therefore, must involve the arbitrary 
infusion into them of the very nature of the 
government of heaven. Here is a miracle, and 
this is the law of Biogenesis. This law blocks 
the way of progress at the border line of every 
distinct stage of development. But each sep- 
arate stage in the earthly development of the 
kingdom of heaven is an enlarged promise of the 
fulfillment, until at last (Mark 1:14,15) Jesus 
came into Galilee preaching the Gospel of the 
Kingdom of God, and saying, The time is ful- 
filled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent 
ye, and believe the Gospel. 



22 The Trend of the Ages. 

The meaning of the law and the prophets 
which were till John, and every means for the 
establishment of the kingdom of God in its Gos- 
pel form on earth, are now explained in the light 
of the Gospel which in the beginning of the full- 
ness of time says: "Except ye repent, ye shall all 
likewise perish." 

Predestination is fatalism by whoever or what- 
ever a thing is unalterably predestinated. What- 
ever is predestinated has its fate fixed in the act 
of predestinating or predetermining it. Herein 
is the distinction between the ultimate purpose 
of God and the thing predetermined. A pur- 
pose may be predetermined upon, but it is not 
the thing predestinated. The thing purposed is 
the meaning of the thing predestinated, and ex- 
plains the reason for the predestinating act. 
The rationale of predestination is that some 
things are not arbitrarily determined. While 
they are related to the thing fated more or less 
remotely, as effect is related to cause, they do 
not sustain the same relation to a first cause as 
that which was unalterably fixed by the original 
act of predestination. This is the meaning of 
related influences in the progress of develop- 
ment. Thus we trace the history of what we 
are and what we enjoy, mutually affecting each 
other in earth's civilization, back to a time of 
absolute miracle, when the first thing affecting 



Predestination in the Trend of the Ages. 23 

our present destiny was necessarily predeter- 
mined in the most arbitrary manner. The grad- 
ual removal from absolute miracle in the prede- 
termination of things to the natural in the deter- 
mination of the human will is but the gradual 
transfer of the right to choose, which is propor- 
tioned more and more to the individual as he as- 
cends the scale of human development. We are 
given the right to choose and determine as we 
become capable of choosing and determining. 

The development and consequent introduction 
of free choice as a factor in determining what 
the individual shall do and what shall happen to 
him does not in the least change the nature of 
the government whose trend has been constantly 
in that direction since its arbitrary and miracu- 
lous beginning. While the limitations of gov- 
ernment multiply and the government of heaven 
becomes less arbitrary as to what man shall do 
and be, it does not become less arbitrary as to 
the results of wrong doing. While it is a trans- 
fer of responsibility it is not a change of the 
grounds of responsibility. History therefore is 
only the fulfillment of God's purpose to make 
man responsible when he is capable of free per- 
sonal choice. 

In the beginning man did not choose to exist 
on the earth, because he could not; but God de- 
termined it for him. But now we see much that 



24 The Trend of the Ages. 

contributes to health and long life fully commit- 
ted to man's use and keeping. He also has the 
means and power of self-destruction subject to 
his will, and is free to us them, as many do. The 
same is true of man's spiritual being. He was 
made a living soul without his consent, but the 
means and power to improve or damage his spir- 
itual condition are now subject to his own voli- 
tion. The means and manner of putting the 
laws of health and of spiritual well-being under 
man's volitionary control describe almost the 
limits of predestination as recorded in God's 
dealings with men. There is a period in which 
a child must be governed arbitrarily, because it 
is unable to choose, and is therefore not respon- 
sible. So it was with an infant world. There 
comes a time in the child's development when it 
naturally assumes the function of choice in some 
things, and the arbitrary in its government gives 
way to that extent. So it has been in the devel- 
opment of our world, which is the child of our 
Father's care. 

This divine thought of humanity has advanced 
in the progress of the world's government to 
where the Gospel invites the individual to be- 
come the child of him who is the Father of all 
that is good. The exact time when the child 
actually becomes responsible is not perhaps well 
marked and defined, but it is more and more rec- 



Predestination in the Trend of the Ages, 25 

ognized till at last it is fully and authoritatively 
acknowledged. So it was till the first Pentecost 
after the Lord's resurrection. Since then, "The 
Spirit and the bride say, come; and let him that 
heareth say, come; and let him that is athirst 
come; and whosoever will, let him take of the 
water of life freely." Till then the transfer of 
responsibility for the loss of the soul was not 
authoritatively announced, though it may have 
actually passed to the individual in many cases. 
Till then the arbitrary involved the election of 
the individual to salvation, while since then 
every one is exhorted to make his peace, calling 
and election sure. 

Predestination involving the election of some 
to salvation even before the foundation of the 
world has become an historical fact, and its place 
is found in the history of those things which 
were. It has no place in doctrinal truth. It in 
no sense describes the essential character of him 
who is the way, the truth, and the life. He is all 
inclusive, and only he who wills not to trust, 
know and love him is excluded from participa- 
tion in his beneficent character. Predestination 
involving the unconditional election of some to 
eternal life was never intended to be understood 
as a doctrinal principle unalterably associated 
with the nature of the Trinity. It is ever 
mentioned in terms of merest incident which 



26 The Trend of the Ages. 

associates it with historical expedients in the 
development of God's wonderful plan of the 
ages. Thus, in Eph. 3:1-12, Paul explains his 
own conversion, call and qualification in relation 
to God's plan of saving the Gentile world. 
Paul's conversion, though declared by him to 
have been out of due season, was wholly mirac- 
ulous as well as supernatural, and in speaking of 
those unconditionally predestinated to eternal 
life he includes himself and gives the reason for 
it: 4 'That I should preach among the Gentiles 
the unsearchable riches of Christ," and, "To the 
intent that now unto the principalities and pow- 
ers in heavenly places might be known by the 
church the manifold wisdom of God." This, he 
says, was according to the eternal purpose which 
he purposed in Christ. While unconditional 
election is inconsistent with free choice in the 
same person, it is according to the purpose of 
free choice in the further development of God's 
plan of the ages. Hence, he says: "Unto him 
be glory in the church by Jesus Christ through- 
out all ages, world without end. Amen." 

Through the manifold wisdom of God, involv- 
ing every necessary expedient, including the 
qualification arbitrarily imposed upon some in 
their unconditional election to eternal life, the 
light breaks through the church and is vocalized 
in a world-wide song of freedom. 



The Bride of the Christ. 27 



CHAPTER III. 

THE BRIDE OF THE CHRIST. 

"And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on Mount Zion, 
and with him a hundred forty and four thousand, having" 
his Father's name written in their foreheads." Rev. 14:1. 

This scene of earth which was pictured to 
John in his vision is full of interest as well as 
meaning, because it is associated with Mount 
Zion in Jerusalem and marks the beginning of 
the present dispensation of the Holy Spirit, 
when the Spirit and the bride began with united 
voice to say, come, to whosoever will, to take the 
water of life freely. 

In pointing out who they were as well as their 
number, we identify them in their connection 
with God's plan in the redemption of our race 
and their appearance then and there. They will 
no longer stand apart from the great throng of 
the redeemed as an anomaly of divine love and 
favoriteism, but will appear as a necessary part 
of one harmonious movement, and as one of 
the most interesting incidents in the trend of the 
ages. 

That they were the elect bride of Christ, and 
that this scene represents their marriage to the 



28 The Trend of the Ages. 

Lamb through the eternal Spirit on the day of 
Pentecost after our Lord's resurrection, there is 
no room to doubt. That they were the complete 
number of those chosen before the foundation of 
the world, and called along the ages, being con- 
formed to the image of Christ that he might be 
a first-born among the many brethren, and that 
they constituted the church of first-borns, whose 
names were written in heaven, which Paul also 
associates with Jerusalem, is as certain as that 
the Scriptures are best seen in their own light. 

With the establishment of their identity with 
the elect bride the conclusion that they were 
visibly represented as a completed number on 
the day of Pentecost by the hundred and twenty, 
with whom and upon whom rested the visible 
signs of a perfect union with Christ, is indis- 
putable. While the evidence may not appear in 
the form of positive proof, it is nevertheless con- 
clusive. 

They were all Jews. Rev. 7:4. So were those 
chosen before the foundation of the world. Eph. 
1:12-13; Rom. 8:29; 11:2. They were guileless. 
Rev. 14. So were the true Israelites who be- 
came disciples of Christ. John 1:47. They 
were first fruits. Rev. 14:14. So were the 
elect. Eph. 1:12; Jas. 1:18. First fruits here is 
in the nature of the case the same as first-borns, 
which the elect are called and by which they are 



The Bride of the Christ 29 

designated as a church. Heb. 12:23. And here 
it is associated with Mount Zion as are the hun- 
dred and forty and four thousand. They fol- 
lowed the Lamb whithersoever he went. Rev. 
14:4. This is just what the first Jewish disciples 
did. They were not defiled with women. Rev. 
14:4. Neither was the elder son who repre- 
sented the elect Jew in the parable of the prod- 
igal. Luke 15:31. They wore no robes, neither 
did the elder son, for they needed none to cover 
their shame, as did the prodigal and the in- 
numerable company who came out of great trib- 
ulations. We have seen that they were all Jews, 
and if constituting the church, which was the 
Bride, that church would be Jewish as to nation- 
ality. 

When described as a city the Bride is wholly 
Jewish. Moreover Christ called his Jewish fol- 
lowers a city. Matt. 5:14. He also said they 
were the light of the world. Matt. 5:14. The 
nations are to walk in the light of this city which 
is called the Bride, the Lamb's wife. Rev. 21 :24. 
Here appears the object and purpose of election. 
The world was in darkness and needed light. 
The church of first-borns was an inspired church, 
and thus they were like a city set on a hill and 
illuminated with a heavenly light. In the light 
of that city on a hill the nations of them that are 
saved are walking to-day, and will continue to 



30 The Trend of the Ages. 

walk in it till a company which no man can num- 
ber will stand, not with the Lamb on Mount 
2a ion, as did the hundred and forty and four 
thousand on the day of Pentecost, but before 
the throne and before the Lamb, in the end of 
the ages. And they will have washed their 
robes and made them white in the blood of the 
Lamb. The old dispensation closed with the 
gathering together of the residue of the hundred 
and forty and four thousand Jews who had the 
Father's name written upon them. These were 
the remnant which had survived according to 
the election of grace. This dispensation will 
close with an innumerable company out of all 
nations and kindreds and people and tongues. 

Paul was one of the elect, but, as he says, 
born out of due time. He was one of the first- 
borns, but born into the visible family of the 
elect after Pentecost. Thus John saw him (Rev. 
14:6), as the elect apostolic messenger (angel) 
to the Gentiles, having the everlasting Gospel to 
preach to every nation and kindred and tongue 
and people. There was a Gospel which pro- 
claimed the kingdom at hand. It was limited to 
the scattered sheep (elect) of the house of Israel, 
and to the time of Christ's earthly ministry. 
But this is the Gospel of the great commission 
to all nations and to all time till the consumma- 
tion of the ages. 



The Bride of the Christ 31 

The first was necessary to the latter as the 
election of the church of first-borns before the 
foundation of the world was necessary to the 
election of believing Gentiles in sanctification of 
Spirit and belief of truth. Thus the hundred 
and forty and four thousand stood with him that 
the blood-washed millions might stand before 
him when the great day of his wrath is come. 
Paul says that one was the foundation and the 
other is builded thereon. And in this explana- 
tion he finds himself a prisoner of Jesus Christ 
for the Gentiles. He says the grace of an elect 
apostleship was given to him that he might 
preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable 
riches of Christ. To the intent that now unto 
the principalities and powers in heavenly places 
might be known by the church the manifold wis- 
dom of God. And here nearly the whole of his 
letter to the Ephesians might be read into this 
chapter. 

What manifold wisdom is manifest in the dis- 
pensational methods of that spiritual movement 
which marks the trend of the ages towards the 
final revelation of God's ultimate purpose. How 
vain must be the attempt of any one to take 
a group of passages from the Bible which relate 
to God's dealings with men in one age of the 
world and thus convey an idea of what he must 
do and how he must do it at all times. 



32 The Trend of the Ages. 

And yet this is what many call theology. As 
in the development of the human body the silent 
forces of nature employ different methods at dif- 
ferent stages, so God has done with the race 
from its infancy, and thus he will do till it is 
perfected in righteousness. 

The love of God is the one great anomaly and 
is as uniform in the wars of Israel as in the 
peace and quiet of the home in Bethany. The 
hundred and forty and four thousand do not 
stand apart in the revelation of his dealings 
with men, but illustrate only the harmony of 
contrast in the same but multiform plan. 

Those chosen in Christ before the foundation 
of the world are not of divine f avoriteism, but of 
the divine favor manifested through them to all 
men until the time of his perfected kingdom. 

Through their appointment and the revela- 
tion to them of the mystery which was hid in 
God the redeemed shall all at last be brought 
into the unity of the faith and of the knowledge 
of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the 
measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. 



His Foreknowledge. 33 



CHAPTER IV. 

HIS FOREKNOWLEDGE. 

The heart question of partially enlightened 
men as to the perfect foreknowledge of God as 
the ground of predestination is answered in the 
explanation of God's manifold wisdom. The 
perfection of mind is not manifest in taking 
cognizance of all intermediate incidents, but in 
its ability to grasp the end with certainty from 
the beginning. The mind of God is not ex- 
pressed perfectly in what the world is or has 
been, but in what it is to be, "Known unto the 
Lord are all his works from the beginning," and 
' 'Whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate 
to be conformed to the image of his Son." That 
Christ, the Son, might be a first-born among 
many brethren is the reason given. That which 
essentially forms the thing given as the reason, 
describes the limits of foreknowledge and pre- 
destination as accurately as the things fore- 
known and predestinated determined the thing 
purposed and effected by it. What he predesti- 
nated was equal to any emergency, and it was 
not essential to his manifold wisdom that he 
should take cognizance of everything which 

3 



34 The Trend of the Ages. 

might oppose itself in its impotency to hinder. 
Thus he gave the prophets to see the end and 
things afar off. What we have to be thankful 
for in reading the Bible is that in the course of 
events God's manifold wisdom in dealing with 
incidents has been as perfect as his foreknowl- 
edge of the things which he predetermined. 
Thus he perpetuates his active sovereignty. 
Had he at any time chosen to take cognizance of 
all future events so as to decree them, we would 
now be deprived of the active sovereignty of 
God, who in manifold wisdom continues to rule 
over us. 

The manifold wisdom of God makes the ends 
of beneficent government as certain as the pre- 
determination of all intermediate events; and it 
admits of another explanation of sin and its re- 
sults in human experience without imputing 
them to his decrees. It preserves him, in 
theory, as an active sovereign forever, while it 
makes the devil responsible for sin as the Bible 
teaches. It is not necessary to say that God 
could not have predestinated everything. It is 
only necessary to say that he did not. This we 
can say without denying his power to take 
cognizance of everything beforehand so as to 
decree it. But if we say that he did predestinate 
and decree everything, we deny to him ever 
afterwards the right and power of his manifold 



His Foreknowledge. 35 

wisdom. If, as those who contend for universal 
predestination, we strive to determine what God 
had done from our conception of what he is or 
must be, we will always be unhappy in our con- 
templation of him and his works. 

But if we will permit a conception of him from 
what he has done and is doing, we will be happy 
in every thought of him, as the Father of our 
spirits. For "He so loved the world as to give 
his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth 
on him should not perish, but have everlasting 
life." Christ as a propitiation, through faith in 
his blood, was set forth in the faith of Abraham 
beforehand, to declare his righteousness at this 
time, that he might be just and the justifier of 
him that believeth in Jesus. 

The manifold wisdom of God included all his 
decrees, but it did not bind him to the inviolable 
rule of predestinating everything. Otherwise 
his wisdom could not be manifold. Even the 
power to foreknow does not involve the neces- 
sity of foreknowing all things. Power and 
right, whether resident or conferred, involves 
an occasion of choosing, and even men choose 
not to know. They even decree that they will 
not take cognizance of things beforehand, and 
thus refuse to be responsible for them. In 
speaking of the abominations of Israel and 
Judah, afterwards, God said: "It had not come 



36 The Trend of the Ages. 

into my mind that they should do such things. " 
Nevertheless he did know that out of Judah 
there should come a governor that should rule 
his people. He had a purpose in national Israel 
and decreed some things concerning it; and for 
the rest he dealt with them in manifold wisdom, 
sometimes afflicting them and scattering them 
abroad, and sometimes repenting of what he had 
thought to do unto them, but always equal to 
what their case demanded. 

The true idea of God's providential dealings 
with Israel is expressed in Ps. 47:4: "He shall 
choose our inheritance for us." It was to be 
continuous, involving the future as well as the 
past. The choosing was to be as continuous as 
the blessings of their inheritance. Thus he has 
dealt with individuals as a benevolent Father, 
as well as Maker, and thus he has dealt with na- 
tions and the world. Thus he is dealing with us 
to-day under the reign of Christ whenever we 
allow that he may. The unconditional election 
to salvation of the prophets pointed to the com- 
ing of him who said: "Ye shall know the truth, 
and the truth shall make you free." He became 
the end of the law for righteousness to those 
who believe, as a knowledge of him frees us 
from mental blindness and consequent slavery. 

Hence, he says, "If the Son make you free ye 
shall be free indeed." When he had finished his 



His Foreknowledge. 37 

work and brought his followers to know him and 
the power of his resurrection, he asserted that 
all authority was given unto him in heaven and 
in earth, and commanded them to make disciples 
of all nations, promising to be with them at all 
times to the end of the ages. Referring again 
to the predestined and miraculous conversion of 
Paul in the most arbitrary manner, showing that 
he was a previously chosen vessel, though born 
out of due season, we note that his commission 
to the Gentiles was to open their eyes, and to 
turn them from darkness (mental blindness) to 
light (mental freedom) and from the power of 
Satan unto God, that they may receive forgive- 
ness of sins, and inheritance among them that 
are sanctified by faith. 

No longer does the election and salvation of 
the soul depend upon a divine decree, but upon 
how we choose to use the opportunity when 
turned from darkness unto light by the Gospel 
which has now become the power of God unto 
salvation to the believer. The soul depends no 
longer on what God foreknew, but upon what it 
has learned and knows of Christ by the Gospel. 
This is the last, and now the only hope. "How 
shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation 
which at the first began to be spoken by the 
Lord and was confirmed into us by them that 
heard him? God also bearing them witness 



38 The Trend of the Ages. 

both with signs and wonders and with divers 
miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according 
to his own will." 

Christ was a first-born among many brethren 
Who were predestinated to be conformed to his 
image. These were all foreknown, predes- 
tinated, called, justified, sanctified, and glorified 
before Paul wrote his letter to the Romans. 
Speaking of those whom the Father had given 
him, Christ said, "As I am in the world, so are 
they in the world." And, "The glory which 
thou hast given me, I have given them." They 
were in the world that the world might know 
that the Father had sent the Son, and they had 
been conformed to the image of the Son. They 
had been glorified (illumined), inspired for their 
relation to and position in the world, just as 
Jesus has been prepared for his according to the 
foreknowledge and determinate council of God. 
Christ had given them the Father's word and 
not his own. He had kept them in his Father's 
name as the Father's sovereign miraculous gift 
in predetermining who and what they should be. 
The experience of the Saviour must have been 
peculiarly thrilling as the time grew near in the 
development of God's plan of the ages when the 
line hidden from ages past should be crossed and 
the announcement made that men are now 
responsible for the salvation or loss of their own 



His Foreknowledge. 39 

souls, in their own sovereign right of choice. 
He had manifested the Father's name to the 
men whom the Father had given. He had given 
them the very words which the Father had 
given to him and they had received them. He 
saw them as vessels of honor prepared unto 
glory and holding the mystery of life for ages 
yet unborn. No wonder that he now prayed, 
' 'Keep through thine own name those whom 
thou hast given me. " ' 'I pray not for the world, 
but for them which thou has given me, for they 
are thine." 

"The mystery which in other ages was not 
made known to the sons of men is now revealed 
unto his holy apostles and prophets by the 
Spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, 
and of the same body, and partakes of his prom- 
ise in Christ by the Gospel.*' Through these 
men whom he was about to leave in the world 
the knowledge of God and the throne of his 
power was to be stretched out to the farthest 
limits of nations yet unborn. They were to 
preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable 
riches of Christ. And to make all men see 
what is the fellowship of the mystery which 
from the beginning of the world was hid in 
God who created all things by Jesus Christ.- 
To the intent that now unto the principalities 
and powers in heavenly places might be known 



40 The Trend of the Ages. 

by the church the manifold wisdom of God. 
What a church of first-born ones was that which 
should rise just beyond the world's great trag- 
edy clothed with the power of a Pentecostal 
blessing, and with the authority, conferred in 
occular manifestations of heavenly wisdom, to 
proclaim in the haunts of ignorance and vice, 
and also in the centers of learning, that the 
times of this ignorance God winked at, but now 
commandeth all men everywhere to repent. And 
yet what awful trials lay in the path of these 
men partially unseen as they were moving to- 
ward the pivotal point where Jesus cried, ' 'Now 
is the crisis of this world." The struggle was 
on, and the world of mind was feeling after 
God who had fixed the times before appointed. 
Human will and volition were reaching out the 
hand with feelings of uncertainty through the 
mysterious consciousness of material form upon 
which life had impinged. But the Father kept 
the men, whom he had chosen, in his own name, 
until the darkest hour was past. Then Christ 
reappeared in resurrection life clothed with 
all authority in heaven and earth. Humanity is 
glorified in me. "And ye shall receive power 
after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you. 
And ye shall be witnesses unto me in Jerusalem 
and in Judea and Samaria and unto the utter- 
most parts of the earth." And when the day of 



His Foreknowledge. 41 

Pentecost was fully come they were all of one 
accord in one place ready for the Son to be glo- 
rified in them. What a oneness of heaven and 
earth that day when the line was crossed. "I in 
them, and thou in me, that they may be perfect 
in one." "Suddenly there came a sound as of a 
mighty rushing wind and filled all the house 
where they were." "Christ is exalted to be 
a prince and a Saviour." "He has granted re- 
pentance and remission of sins." "Whosoever 
calleth on the name of the Lord shall be saved." 
"The promise is unto you and to your children, 
and to them that are afar off, even to as many as 
the Lord our God shall call." 

What a baptismal benediction of the Holy 
Ghost in behalf of those who would believe on 
him through their word! It was the marriage 
supper of the Lamb. The church of first-borns 
for whom the whole family in heaven and earth 
were to be named had made herself ready, and 
heaven's sovereign power unites with the right 
of free choice in an age of wedlock. The earth 
has been in expectancy and heaven has been 
silent for the space of half an hour. But the age 
of free grace is about to begin. 

The Gospel is now to be preached to every 
nation, kindred, tribe and people, and in the cer- 
emonies of this day the inspired church is to be- 
come the pillar and ground of the truth. The 



42 The Trend of the Ages. 

city on a hill has been illuminated and the 
nations are to walk in the light of it. Well did 
the scene compare in John's vision with the 
things which are yet to be. For there stood on 
Mount Zion a hundred and forty and four thou- 
sand whom the Father had sealed, and they sang 
the song which none could learn but the hun- 
dred and forty and four thousand. These are 
they which were not defiled with women; for 
they are virgins. These are they which follow 
the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These were 
redeemed from among men, being the first fruits 
unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth 
was found no guile; for they are without fault 
before the throne of God. Christ had loved the 
church of first-borns whose names were written 
in heaven and had given himself for it, to be its 
head, as the husband is the head of the wife; 
and now he presents it to himself a glorious 
church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such 
thing; holy and without blemish. Its members 
had been "chosen in Christ before the founda- 
tion of the world, that they should be holy and 
without blame before him in love." Now they 
are joined to him in one body through the eter- 
nal Spirit. Earth's expectancy gives place to 
the realization of a new era as heaven's silence 
is broken by the new song of redemption. 
Jerusalem, the exalted, becomes the mother of 



His Foreknowledge. 43 

us all; and, as God speaks with tongues of fire, 
the darkness of ages past rolls away and the 
mystery is explained as Peter stands up to 
preach. 



44 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE MARRIAGE PARTY AND THE GUESTS. 

"For many are called, but few are chosen." Matt. 
22:14. 

The development of the kingdom of heaven is 
made manifest in the arbitrary acts of the king 
preparing for the marriage of his Son. That 
which was essential to his purpose was fixed in 
his general plan arbitrarily and beyond all con- 
tingencies. While many were called, or invited, 
those who were to be an essential part of the 
real transaction were chosen, selected, and 
picked out in such a manner as to involve no un- 
certainty. 

Others might be guests also, and hence a 
larger number than the elect, including every 
Jew, was invited to the marriage supper of the 
Lamb. It will be observed that invited guests 
were required to wear a wedding garment, which 
distinguished them from those present who were 
an essential part of the marriage party. The 
word here translated garment is "enduma," and 
means anything put on; that is, anything put on 
answering the purpose of such designation. It 
may be identical with the robe put upon the 



The Marriage Party and the Guests. 45 

prodigal, because a long robe (stole) would an- 
swer the purpose of designation at the marriage 
supper as well as to cover him at the judgment. 

Here is an invitation to the Jewish nation to 
prepare for and attend the marriage of the spir- 
itual children of Abraham to the offspring of 
David. It was in the fullness of the dispensa- 
tion of time, or when the time had fully come 
and the bride had made herself ready. 

That this general invitation to the Jews was a 
genuine offer of salvation there is no doubt, for 
Christ, lamenting over Jerusalem, said, "How 
oft would I have gathered you as a hen gathers 
her brood, but ye would not." That some or 
even many of them who were not chosen did ac- 
cept the invitation as on the day of Pentecost 
there can scarcely be any doubt, and there were 
some in company with and even claiming to be 
a part of the church at Jerusalem who were 
neither chosen nor saved, as in the case of Ana- 
nias and Sapphira. 

The wedding garment, of course, is only a 
figure, but it serves to show the difference be- 
tween those who were the chosen members of 
the elect bride and those who were only Jewish 
guests at the wedding. It is hardly to be ques- 
tioned that the hundred and twenty who were 
waiting for the promise of the Father were the 
visible residue of the hundred and forty and four 



46 The Trend of the Ages. 

thousand who were doubtless present on that 
day, for it was the hundred and twenty who 
were married to Christ in heavenly splendor and 
a baptism of the Holy Ghost. 

But there were added to them the same day 
about three thousand souls. The mere visible 
presence of one on such an occasion would not 
constitute a guest in any spiritual sense, hence 
we are bound to conclude that to be a guest con- 
ferred spiritual benefits which saved the person 
from being spiritually cast out. 

The chosen were known, foreknown, as such, 
and the guests were recognized by the wedding 
garment. One, therefore, neither foreknown 
and chosen as a member of the inspired bride 
nor wearing the garment of a guest, was easily 
detected. 

The Jews understood perfectly that the eter- 
nally elect were all Jews, but their mistake was 
that they supposed all Jews were eternally 
elected to salvation and that when Messiah came 
the Jewish nation would be his bride. He was 
teaching differently, as John had also taught, 
and showing that while all Jews could be admit- 
ted as guests and saved, they need not expect to 
be saved because they were Jews. The marriage 
shall be within the Jewish nation, but with Israel- 
ites in whom there is no guile. 

No one can say that any church, as a church, 



The Marriage Party and the Guests. 47 

was ever baptized with the Holy Ghost except 
the hundred and twenty on the day of Pentecost. 
These were inspired as a body, and while others 
were filled with the Holy Spirit afterwards, 
these were recognized as the Church of Christ, 
who had journeyed with him and been witnesses 
of his resurrection. They were the residue of 
the chosen few; the Bride, now married to him 
through the eternal Spirit. From this day on 
"there was no difference between the Jew and 
the Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich 
unto all that call upon him." 

There is a lesson here to be learned. The 
Jews thought that, because all the chosen were 
Jews, all the Jews were chosen. Some in like 
manner think because all the chosen were Chris- 
tians, all Christians were chosen. He who bases 
his hope of salvation on the idea that he is 
chosen to salvation will be like the Jew at the 
wedding feast, without the wedding garment. 
Men are not now cast into outer darkness be- 
cause they are not chosen, nor were they then, 
but because they will not be genuine guests. 

Some will not come at all, while some think 
no preparation is necessary in order to come 
properly and be saved. The Jew is only human, 
and the mistake of the Jew is the mistake of 
humanity. This text is the answer to those who 
presume upon the sovereign power of God to 



48 The Trend of the Ages. 

save whom he will. It is true that some, a few, 
are chosen; but to those who despair of being of 
the few, and feel that they have no claim upon 
the divine sovereignty, the text also says, "Many 
are called." 

The trend of the ages has ever been from the 
few towards the many. In education and knowl- 
edge and psychic power it has been so, and will 
continue so until the very gates of the kingdom 
of God, which at first by arbitrary miracle stood 
ajar to the few, will in fact stand wide open to 
all by day and night forever. 

Even now the many are called, and when the 
veil which hung over the minds of the Jews, and 
has been made to darken counsel by modern 
theologians as well, shall be taken away, it will 
be found that the feast still continues and that 
all things are ready for all men. 



Some Given ; Others Accepted. 49 



CHAPTER VI. 

SOME GIVEN; OTHERS ACCEPTED. 

"All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and 
him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." John 
6:37. 

This is not merely the divine and human sides 
of the salvation of the same persons, as has been 
foolishly asserted. He came not, but to the lost, 
scattered sheep of the house of Israel. Until 
his earthly mission in the flesh was complete he 
went to none other. In them and through them 
he was preparing the way for the world to come 
to him. The number given to him by the Father 
was as definite as the purpose for which they 
were given. At the time he came they formed 
the residue of those among the Jews which along 
the ages were the real Israel of God. They 
were those whom he foreknew as his people ac- 
cording to the election of grace, of whom Paul 
said a remnant remained when he wrote to the 
Romans. He was preparing to finish the work 
and cut it short in righteousness; and, though 
the number of the children of Israel be as the 
sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved. 



50 The Trend of the Ages. 

The first-fruits unto God and unto the Lamb 
were exactly an hundred and forty and four 
thousand, and they were all Jews. Of this res- 
idue who were coming to him as sheep that know 
the voice of the shepherd, he said, "They are 
not of the world, as I am not of the world." 
"Thine they were and thou gavest them me." 
1 'And all mine are thine and thine are mine and 
I am glorified in them." These were given to 
Christ that he might be glorified in them, and 
thus glorify the Father on the earth and finish 
the work which the Father had given him to do. 
This he did by giving them the words the Father 
had given him, and then he prays for the glory 
he had with the Father before the world was. 

In John 6:39, he says it is the Father's will 
"that of all which he had given him he should 
lose nothing. This shows that some were not 
given to him, for some were lost. But in the 
next verse he also says that it is the Father's 
will that every one that seeth the Son and be- 
lieveth on him may have everlasting life. In 
the order in which the truth has been revealed 
and handed down to us we have expressed the 
Father's will, first, concerning those given to 
Christ and come to Christ as the inevitable re- 
sult, and then concerning those who would come 
to Christ, believing in order to be received by 
him. The first are his because they were given 



Some Given; Others Accepted. 51 

to him, and they shall come to him, for he shall 
have his own. The rest were not his, for they 
had not been given to him, but since it is the 
Father's will that all who come believing shall 
have everlasting life, he will cast out none who 
come. The thirty-ninth verse is a message to 
the remnant according to the election of grace, 
while the fortieth verse is a message to the 
world of mankind. One is the gospel of the 
the kingdom of heaven preached to the scattered 
sheep of the house of Israel. The other is the 
gospel of everlasting life, preached to ' "who- 
soever" will believe on Christ. 

One was preached under the first commission 
by the seventy, but in no Gentile city, nor in the 
way which led to the Samaritans. The other is 
since Pentecost, being preached under the last 
great commission to all the world. Here is that 
other angel (minister) afterwards which John 
saw flying in mid-heaven (center of population, 
and it was Paul born out of due time, the repre- 
sentative of a world-wide evangelism) having 
the everlasting gospel to preach to every nation, 
and kindred, and tongue and people. Under the 
first commission the sheep heard his voice and 
followed him. The lost, or scattered sheep 
which were not of the fold, or in the fold, he 
said, must be brought in that there be one fold 
and one shepherd. It was under this first com- 



52 The Trend of the Ages. 

mission that he finished the work which he cut 
short in righteousness. 

There were only an hundred and forty and 
four thousand, including Paul, who was born out 
of due time, who in the beginning of the dis- 
pensation of faith and free grace, that stood 
robeless and pure with him on Mount Zion. 

Now let us stand before the throne and before 
the Lamb, at the judgment day, and see the re- 
sults of the message to whomsoever will. Out 
of every nation and kindred and tribe, and peo- 
ple and tongue, there is a great company which 
no man can number. They have come out of 
great tribulation. They have washed their robes 
and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 
The prodigal has come home a numberless mul- 
titude, and is in no wise cast out, but is robed in 
spotless white. The best robe (stole), a long 
robe which covers him to his feet. "Blessed is 
he whose sins are covered." He was not created 
in Christ Jesus unto good works as was the elder 
son who was ever with the Father, but he is 
saved by grace through faith. He has come to 
himself in a faraway place and returned from 
feeding swine. He has multiplied in kind under 
the good news of whomsoever will may come 
until from every nation under the sun earth's 
prodigal sons have come to where they are in no 
wise cast out. They shall hunger no more, 



Some Given ; Others Accepted. 53 

neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun 
light on them nor any heat. For the Lamb 
which is in the midst of the throne shall feed 
them, and shall lead them unto living fountains 
of water; and God shall wipe away all tears 
from their eyes. 

Those who reject the larger hope for those 
who were not specifically given to Christ by the 
Father, and limit the great salvation to the 
eternally elect, are of the same temper of the 
elder son when he found that the returning prod- 
igal had not been cast out. Nevertheless, the 
fatted calf has been killed. Moreover, it is 
the sound of music and dancing which excites 
their envious incredulity. But the music will 
continue until earth's unbelief will give way to 
the universal song of a world redeemed. 



54 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE INSPIRED CHURCH ON THE ROCK. 

"Upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates 
of hell shall not prevail against it." 

Mere ecclesiastical interpretations of Christ's 
words must be as vain as they are selfish, and as 
senseless as he who seeks to build a party in the 
kingdom of heaven. Christ was building a 
church for himself which was to be his Bride. 
When presented to himself she was to be with- 
out spot or wrinkle. She was to be the pillar 
and ground of the truth. When it was completed, 
nothing more nor less than the church of first- 
born ones whose names were written in heaven. 
It was composed of those whom God foreknew, 
called, justified, and glorified (illumined), and 
thus conformed to the image of his Son, that he, 
his Son, might be a first born among many 
brethren. "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, 
for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto 
thee, but my Father which is in heaven." The 
church of Christ, the Bride, the pillar and 
ground of the truth, to all future ages, must 
have a bed-rock foundation. 



The Inspired Church on the Bock. 55 

The visible expression of the truth must rest 
here through the ages. This was to be the one 
and only pattern for all future churches. It 
must stand in the annals of history not only as 
the birthplace of Christendom and the mother of 
us all, but also securely in the right of inspired 
and authoritative example. She must be a 
woman in the moon, clothed with the sun and a 
crown with stars upon her head. Not only an 
object lesson, but to the world and to the ages 
of ecclesiastical thought a source of light to the 
end of time. 

Resident in her and transmissible must be the 
light of the glory of God as it shines in the face 
of Jesus Christ. As the sun brings a succession 
of days, with nights between, so she must be the 
one indestructible light which, after seasons of 
corruption and darkness, shall light the hill tops 
of coming ages in the revolutions of kindreds 
and peoples. Back to her who was the Lamb's 
wife must the nations go for an example and 
pattern when they rise, again and again from 
the oppression of ecclesiastical hate. If the 
time should come when the instruments of per- 
secution, the very gates of hell, should prevail 
against those who love and serve Christ alone, 
to destroy them and their history, there must be 
one incorruptible and indestructible light in the 
horizon of the east to meet the gaze of inquiring 



56 The Trend of the Ages. 

men when the earth rolls back in the revolutions 
of time. 

Upon the solid and peculiar rock of inspiration 
and revelation Christ built his church of first- 
borns. Along the ages the stones were being 
numbered as the numbers of an internal and 
spiritual Israel multiplied. The preaching of 
John had served its purpose in making ready a 
people prepared for the Lord. The remnant 
according to the election of grace was gather- 
ing about the Christ, and the revelation of his 
character and Sonship was being made by the 
Father to the men whom the Father had given 
to the Son. How closely must the Saviour have 
watched for the manifestation of that material 
character upon which his church rests securely 
in those whom he taught from day to day. And 
when through Peter the heaven-born conception 
found full expression, we learn of what kind of 
rock it was, and that Peter was a stone of that 
kicd. * 'Flesh and blood hath not revealed it 
unto thee; but my Father which is in heaven." 

The word translated church always contem- 
plates a local assembly. Here it is used with 
reference to a day when those to whom the rev- 
elation had been and should be made should be 
builded together into a local habitation of God 
through the Spirit. And when the day of 
Pentecost was fully come they were all with one 



The Inspired Church on the Bock. 57 

accord in one place waiting for the promise of 
the Father. They were to receive power and be 
made witnesses unto Christ to the uttermost 
parts of the earth. Suddenly there came a 
sound, as of a mighty rushing wind, and it filled 
all the house where they were sitting. And 
they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. From 
this day they continued steadfastly in the apos- 
tles' doctrine and breaking bread, and the Lord 
added the saved to the church. 

There was nothing wanting on the day of 
Pentecost to make it the beginning of a new era. 
There in Jerusalem, on Mount Zion, Abraham 
and David had built altars to their God. Now 
an hundred and forty and four thousand of the 
seed of Abraham stood with the Lamb on Mount 
Zion, a complete body, and were married to the 
offspring of David. The revelation of his ex- 
alted character was made complete, and was in- 
wrought in the living character of his Jewish 
disciples by a baptism of the Holy Ghost which 
marked them as the true Israel of God and des- 
ignated them as the local and inspired church of 
first-born ones. 

This was the church of Christ in that peculiar 
sense in which he said, upon this rock I will 
build my church. It was ever associated with 
Jerusalem, and with no other earthly place, as 
an assembly. As is sometimes said, though im- 



58 The Trend of the Ages. 

properly, of some men, that church can never 
die. Its example lives in its own inspired his- 
tory, and the Spirit which gave it life and power 
will disclose its genius to nations yet unborn. 
As the elect Bride of Christ she still witnesses 
for him and will to the uttermost parts of the 
earth. Along the track of ecclesiastical history 
thousands of churches have come near enough 
to the example given to echo the voice of the 
Spirit and the Bride, but wherever and whenever 
humanity believes and obeys it is because the 
eternal Spirit and the imperishable Bride of 
Christ, which were built upon direct inspiration 
and revelation, are still saying, come. 

Isaiah tells us of a time when there should be 
"a voice crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye 
the way of the Lord, make straight in the 
desert a highway for our God." Then he says: 
* 'O Zion that bringest good tidings, get thee up 
into the mountain; O Jerusalem that bringest 
good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength. " 
"And it shall come to pass in the last days, 
that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be 
established in the top of the mountains, and shall 
be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall 
flow unto it. " "He will teach us of his ways and 
we will walk in his paths; for out of Zion shall 
go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from 
Jerusalem." 



The Inspired Church on the Rock. 59 

In the fulfillment of this, Christ said to two of 
his disciples on the day of his resurrection: 
''Repentance and remission of sins should be 
preached in his name among all nations, begin- 
ning at Jerusalem." Every description of the 
Bride of Christ excludes the possibility of any 
but Jews, whether described as a city or as a 
specifically chosen number. "Wherefore it is 
contained in the Scriptures, Behold I lay in Zion 
a chief corner-stone, elect, precious, and he that 
believeth on him shall not be confounded." 

If the word translated church here does not 
mean a local assembly there is no escape from 
the Catholic interpretation. It it does mean a 
local assembly, let some one say which one of 
the many local assemblies it is, or was, or is to 
be. It was to be a church right here in this 
world, or the language in its connection had no 
significance to those then about to enter upon a 
new dispensation. It was to be composed of 
those who had the rock character like Peter. 
Character which was not human, but created by 
a direct revelation from the Father of the char- 
acter of the Christ. It was this inspired church 
at Jerusalem who gave to Paul the hand of fel- 
lowship and recognized him as an inspired apos- 
tle of Christ. It was this church which settled 
questions for the church at Antioch. It was this 
church which gave to us the inspired New Tes- 



60 The Trend of the Ages. 

tament. It is the light of this church which 
shines to-day and will shine till the stars shall 
shine no more. 



The Bising Temple. 61 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE RISING TEMPLE. 

"And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and 
prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner 
stone." Eph. 2:20. 

As a building rises in magnificent proportions 
and its architectural beauty is outlined in vision, 
we contemplate the purpose, design, and plan of 
the architect. We see in the foundation, material 
and work the evidences of ultimate purpose, and 
in that which rests upon it we behold the beauty 
of manifold wisdom. One is builded upon the 
other until it groweth into a beautiful temple. 
One part explains the other until the contrast 
blends in the most splendid harmony. 

We are getting ready for the finishing touches 
of the Spirit through whom we are elected in 
sanctification of spirit and belief of truth, are 
being builded together, fitly framed and grow- 
ing into a holy temple in the Lord. We are with 
slight change of figure already sitting together 
in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in com- 
ing ages he may show his kindness to us and the 
exceeding riches of his grace. The foundation 
was laid far back in the ages, when his work- 



62 The Trend of the Ages. 

manship was created in Christ Jesus unto good 
works, and now when we are saved by grace 
through faith the visional harmony and beauty 
hid in ages past, but now made known by his 
holy apostles and prophets, is vocalized in har- 
monious strains of redeeming love as the or- 
chestra breaks forth in a temple built for the 
habitation of God. Aliens from the common- 
wealth of Israel are no more strangers to cove- 
nants of promise, having no hope and without God 
in the world, but are fellow-citizens with the 
saints and of the household of God. The dis- 
pensation of the fullness of times is come and 
he is gathering together in one all things in 
Christ. 

The very stones of the temple are living; and 
structural harmony becomes a sweet conscious 
communion, until it bursts forth in song in the 
heavenly places. Apostles are heard, saying, 
1 'Blessed be God and Father of our Lord Jesus 
Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual 
blessing in heavenly places in Christ. Accord- 
ing as he hath chosen us in him before the 
foundation of the world, that we should be holy 
and without blame before him in love." They 
saw more plainly than prophets had ever seen; 
for the mustard seed sown in the darkness of 
unenlightened human minds was beginning to 
blossom towards the great harvest. The birds 



The Rising Temple, 63 

were beginning to shelter in its branches. 
Stones, dead in trespasses and sins, were being 
quickened, and from the quarries of Gentile ob- 
scurity they were being laid one upon another. 
The Gospel is now the power of God unto salva- 
tion, and the nations are trusting in Christ after 
hearing the word of truth, which is the Gospel 
of their salvation. The earnest of the inher- 
itance until the redemption of the purchased 
possession has been given and those who believe 
are being sealed with the Holy Spirit of prom- 
ise. 

How beautiful the prayer which followed this 
apostolic song of thanksgiving and praise. Paul 
saw the building rising according to the eternal 
purpose which was purposed in Christ Jesus and 
bows his knees to the Father, that he would 
grant them according to the riches of his glory 
to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in 
the inner man, that Christ might dwell in them 
by faith, and that, being rooted and grounded 
in love, they might be able to comprehend with 
all the saints what is the breadth and length and 
depth and height. "Unto him be glory in the 
church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, 
world without end. Amen." 

God is being worshipped in spirit and in 
truth. The temple not made with hands is ris- 
ing. The service is continuous in the progress 



64 The Trend of the Ages. 

of the work, and each living stone, as the temple 
rises, confirms the prophecy of its completion in 
the heavens. What a scene is that foretold and 
now foreseen! The holy city has come down 
from God out of heaven prepared as a bride 
adorned for her husband. She will rise again 
through the tribulations of those who have 
washed their robes and made them white in the 
blood of the Lamb. The coronation day will 
come and the final dedication of the completed 
temple. The tabernacle of God shall be with 
men and he will dwell with them. All tears 
shall be wiped away, for there shall be no more 
death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall 
there be any more pain; for the former things 
are passed away. They have been passing as 
the temple of freedom rose and now they are 
passed. And he that sat upon the throne says: 
"I have made all things new." "It is done." 
"He that overcame inherits all things." The 
fearful and unbelieving and abominable, and 
murderers, and whore-mongers, and sorcerers, 
and idolaters, and all liars now have their por- 
tion in the lake which burneth with fire and 
brimstone. 

Carried away into a high mountain, we have 
another view of the city as God, first incarnate 
and then re-incarnate, becomes at last the tem- 
ple thereof. The circle has been squared with 



The Rising Temple. 65 

length and breadth of twelve thousand furlongs, 
and in it is described a perfect circle. Jasper 
has developed into an amethyst and pure gold 
into transparent glass. The moon has disap- 
peared in the brightness of the sun, and the sun 
has been eclipsed by the Lord God Almighty, 
who is the temple and the light thereof. The 
nations who walked in the light of it are saved. 
The kings of the earth have brought their glory 
and honor into it. The gates shall no more be 
shut, and there shall be no night. 

Life impinged upon matter and the struggle 
was on. The flesh lusteth against the Spirit and 
the Spirit against the flesh. Christ came to the 
rescue, restored to life the right of free choice 
and reinforced it by the Holy Spirit in a baptism 
of power, first upon the church of the first-born. 
This inspired church of the living God became 
the pillar and ground of the truth, and truth as 
it is in Jesus has done its work. From the first 
fruits unto God and to the Lamb has come the 
final harvest. And now, a great multitude which 
no one could number of all nations and kindreds, 
and people, and tongues, stood before the throne 
and before the Lamb clothed in white robes and 
palms in their hands, and cried with a loud voice, 
saying, * 'Salvation to our God which sitteth upon 
the throne, and to the Lamb;" while the elect 
messengers fell upon their faces and worshipped 



66 The Trend of the Ages. 

God, saying, "Amen: Blessing, and glory, and 
wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honor, and power, 
and might, be unto our God forever and ever. 
Amen." 



A Church. 67 



CHAPTER IX. 

A CHURCH. 

A church is an incident in the history of a 
great movement. It is an incidental visible ex- 
pression of that which is vital in the movement. 
When all that is vital in a movement in any com- 
munity is purely Christian, the movement will 
express itself in the formation of a church. It 
is as impossible to substitute something else for 
a church as it would be to set fire to a bank of 
powder and substitute something else for an ex- 
plosion. Explosions may differ somewhat in the 
atmospheric vibration which they produce, but 
this only proves that one explosion is not a mere 
mechanical imitation of another. 

The action involves a principle which is the 
same in every case, and while each explosion is 
a separate and distinct incident, every one is at- 
tributable to the same cause. Remote causes 
producing slight variations have nothing what- 
ever to do with the nature of an explosion. 
Neither have remote causes which produce slight 
variations anything to do with the nature of a 
church. 



68 The Trend of the Ages. 

The human form is an incident. It is inci- 
dentally a visible expression of that which is 
vital within. It is, therefore, the visible man. 
But a hand or a foot may be wanting, from acci- 
dent, without destroying the visible form of the 
man. A mere alteration is not the destruction 
of the species. If there were families with only 
one foot or one hand they would only constitute 
distinct varieties of the same species. The spe- 
cies would still be recognizable in the human 
form. 

A church is an assembly of people incidentally 
expressing that which is vital in the relation of 
one member to another. There is danger of 
mistaking that which is merely functional for 
that which is vital, as an inexperienced physi- 
cian may do in treating the body. The inspired. 
page is given to guide us in the development 
and in the functions of a church, but a church is 
the body of Christ. Hence he says: * 'Where 
two or three are gathered together in my name 
there am I in the midst." "The letter killeth, 
but the spirit giveth life." And: "By one Spirit 
we are all baptized into one body." 

A church may be destroyed without the simul- 
taneous destruction of its form. When a man 
commits the rash act of invading the sacred pre- 
cincts of life and commits suicide, the man is 
gone while the form remains. So the perfect 



A Church. 69 

form of a church may remain when the real 
church has been destroyed by the rash invasion 
of material form into the more sacred precincts 
of our spiritual relations. The essential form 
of a church, therefore, is wholly different from 
that which is mechanical. A church is the body 
of Christ, and not merely a body formed after 
the pattern which he dictated. It is Christ's so- 
cial organism. It is the manifest result of the 
Christ inwrought in the social relations of life, 
recognized on their every coming together. 

It is not merely the Christ in the individual, 
nor in several individuals apart from each other. 
It is a local assembly the social relations of 
which manifest the Christ when the members 
worship him together in spirit and in truth. A 
church therefore exists only in an ideal sense 
when assembled in one place, and they are mem- 
bers only who are present. Others are members 
only in an ideal or legal sense. 

The only thing human to which a church is 
really incidental is the coming together in one 
place of those who are possessed of the Spirit of 
the Christ. The worship is in spirit and in 
truth, and the real and substantial form appears 
in the spiritual relation of the worshippers. The 
human body of a believer is a temple of the Holy 
Ghost, but the assembling of these temples in 
one place becomes a city set on a hill and the 



70 The Trend of the Ages. 

light of it cannot be hid. When the members are 
all separated from each other there is no body. 
When the temples are all removed from each 
other they do not constitute a city. And so when 
the members of a church scatter they cease to 
be a church until they come together again. 

We speak of the school as an ideal institution, 
but there is really a school only when school 
keeps. We also speak of the day in the same 
way, but it is day only when the sun is up. 
There is a church only when believers assemble 
and the Son of Righteousness rises upon them. 

What a church is in those things which are 
incidental to remote causes and have nothing to 
do with its nature and real being, is another 
subject. Different circumstances which have 
appeared under different dispensations have pro- 
duced different varieties of the same species. 
Christ was in the church in the wilderness for 
forty years, but the dispensation was different 
and the circumstances were different from ours. 
That church which continued for forty years was 
of the same species, because it was an assembly 
and Christ was in it. But it was not a Gospel 
church, nor was it in variety like anything that 
has been seen since. As an assembly it was in 
migratory existence for forty years, and when- 
ever the redemptive purpose of the Christ life 
appeared it was a church. 



A Church. 71 

During the earthly ministry of the Christ there 
was another migratory church. It was composed 
of Jewish disciples whom God foreknew and 
called, justified and glorified; conforming them 
to the image of his Son, that he might be a first- 
born among many brethren. Christ among them 
was the life of it. He moulded and animated its 
social relations, imparting to its members new 
hopes and new aspirations, developing among 
them the new-born conception of a spiritual 
kingdom. 

This was the church of Jesus Christ. He, and 
not Moses, was its visible, as well as spiritual, 
head, and in this it differed from any other church 
in all the ages. It was the visible social body of 
the visible Christ. 

It was the Jesus Christ church, and the visible 
Bride of the manifested Saviour. It was the 
elect Israel of God chosen from among the Jews 
from before the foundation of the world to be 
the Bride of his Son in the fullness of the dis- 
pensation of times. 

At Pentecost it consisted of an hundred and 
twenty, the remnant of the elect, and the visible 
residue of an hundred and forty and four thou- 
sand Jews who had been sealed as the servants 
of God, whom these hundred and twenty repre- 
sented when they stood with the Lamb on Mount 
Zion in Jerusalem, the manifest spiritual seed of 



72 The Trend of the Ages. 

Abraham, and were married to the offspring of 
David through the eternal Spirit. 

From this day it became a local church; the 
local habitation of God through the Spirit, con- 
tinuing so from day to day in opening a new era 
in the religious life of the world. It was an in- 
spired church, built upon the solid rock of a 
direct revelation of the divine character of Jesus 
Christ, whose Bride it was. 

Each member, as well as Peter, was a stone of 
this kind of rock. Christ said of its members: 
1 'They are not of the world, as I am not of the 
world." And also, "As I am in the world so are 
they in the world." They were one with the 
Father and the Son and constituted the fam- 
ily of God, through whose words given to them 
through the Son the world was to believe on the 
Christ. This church of first-borns, inspired to 
give the Gospel to others, was a prophecy of 
what a church should be through the means em- 
ployed by the Gospel. 

And just so is a real church of Christ now a 
prophecy in its very nature, of what a church 
will be in the golden age to come. The ultimate 
purpose, therefore, in the manifestations of 
church life and power must be a reversion to the 
original type, when they were all together and 
had all things common. They all spake with 
tongues and prophesied, and so it shall be again. 



A Church. 73 

For, on the day of Pentecost, Peter said: "This 
is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel." 
The facts will not justify the conclusion that 
Pentecost was a complete fulfillment of the 
prophecy of Joel, and Peter should not be so 
understood. He quotes much more from Joel 
than was literally fulfilled on that day, but he 
said this that has happened this day, and is hap- 
pening, is that; that in kind, of which Joel 
spoke. What was to be the complete fulfillment, 
as well as a literal fulfillment, was to be in the 
last days. 

Then the Spirit is to be poured out upon all 
flesh, without national distinction, as it was that 
day upon the hundred and twenty first-borns 
who constituted the visible elect Bride of Christ. 
When the last days, or dispensation, of Christ's 
earthly reign shall come, when he shall have be- 
come inwrought into every relation of life, and 
made incarnate in the social order, every social 
and commercial interest of earth will be changed 
into the image of his character. 

And then wherever people meet there will be 
a church, and wherever there is a church there 
will be ocular manifestations of his power. 

They will all speak with tongues and proph- 
esy. The future will then be read like history, 
and be to each one a pleasing story in that golden 
day. 



74 The Trend of the Ages. 

This golden age of the ekklesia is not only the 
hope set before us in the Gospel, but it is also 
written in the heart of every child of grace. It 
is subjective and constitutional in the inwrought 
nature of every believer. The disciples of 
Christ were not mistaken in the idea that 
Christ's kingdom was to be in this world, nor 
were they mistaken in the thought that it was to 
govern in every earthly relation, though they 
were for a time mistaken as to the manner and 
time in which it should come in its complete 
form. They understood him poorly at first, as 
many do to this day. 

He sent them forth to proclaim the kingdom 
at hand; and yet he taught them to pray for the 
time when it should come in its complete form, 
when the will of God would be done on earth as 
it is done by angels in heaven. When that time 
comes, as come it will, character will be as pure 
as that of angels and every assembly will be a 
perfected church. The bush will be a flame of 
fire that does not consume and every foot of earth 
will be holy ground. 

While the progressive nature of the kingdom 
is yet so little understood, it is prophetic in 
the aspiring hope of every true believer in the 
world. 

It is incorporated in the subjective constitu- 
tion of Christ's government, which is written in 



A Cliurch. 75 

every believer's mind and heart. Some time 
this constitutional law will be effective. Some 
time it will be carried by the Spirit into all the 
details of life and the golden rule will material- 
ize in a golden age. Then there will be a church 
in every home, where they shall daily commem- 
orate the wedding feast of Pentecost and un- 
derstand that it was the marriage supper of the 
Lamb. 



76 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER X. 

ELECTION IN SANCTIFICATION. 

"Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the 
Father in sanctification of Spirit unto obedience and 
sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." 1 Peter 1:2. 

"We are bound to give thanks always to God for you, 
brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath from a 
beginning chosen you to salvation in sanctification of 
spirit and belief of truth." 1 Thess. 2:13 

In the great workshop is where we learn how 
things are made. In one we learn how certain 
machines are made, and in another we learn how 
other work is done by their use. One piece of 
machinery is used in the making of another, but 
the method and process of making each is differ- 
ent. Such is the religious history of this world. 

Some men have been created and raised up for 
certain purposes that God might show forth his 
power in them. Their exceptional character is 
incidental, and the exceptional method or pro- 
cess used in their creation is incidental, and is 
related to the use that is to be made of them in 
the ultimate manifestation of God's power. The 
power manifest in them, therefore, is only func- 
tional, and relates to the further and more per- 



Election in Sanctiftcation. 77 

feet manifestation of his power when the thing 
first designed is accomplished. 

With reference to the method or process of 
election which fairly and fully manifests the 
mind and power of God, we must look to the full- 
ness of the dispensation of times when the offices 
of those who were incidentally elected to a spe- 
cial work are producing their results among the 
masses. Here election is said to be in sanctifi- 
cation of spirit and belief of truth. It is also 
said to be according to the foreknowledge of God 
the Father. Known unto the Lord were all his 
works from the beginning, but the final process 
is different from that which was necessary in 
order to bring it about. 

The election of prophets and apostles and an 
inspired church to be the Bride of Christ was 
essential to a revealed religion, while a revealed 
religion which is divine in its nature involves its 
own peculiar and final process. The election of 
the few, therefore, must be separate from the 
election of the many in point of time and pro- 
cess. The few were elected before the founda- 
tion of the world, while the many are elected 
when they believe the truth and are sanctified in 
spirit. The few are created in Christ Jesus unto 
good works, while the many are saved by grace 
through faith, being sanctified in spirit unto 
obedience. 



78 The Trend of the Ages. 

This distinction appears in nearly all of Paul's 
epistles, but especially in the first chapters of 
Ephesians and Colossians. In the first twelve 
verses of Ephesians there is no dodging the 
consequences of the unconditional and eternal 
election of those who first trusted in Christ. 
But the thirteenth verse says: "In whom ye also 
trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, 
the Gospel of your salvation; in whom also, 
after that he believed, ye were sealed with that 
Holy Spirit of promise." The few, including 
those who first believed, were sealed in Christ 
from before the foundation of the world, while 
these to whom he is writing were not sealed in 
him till after they heard the word of truth, the 
Gospel of their salvation, and until after they 
had believed. No one can follow Paul intelli- 
gently through the first three chapters of Ephe- 
sians without observing evidences of this 
distinction everywhere. It broadens the scope 
and possibilities of the dispensation in which we 
live when we see in it the culmination of God's 
multiform plan, projected through the ages and 
distinguished in the very language of inspira- 
tion as the consummation of the ages. 

This was the time long looked for when the 
mountain of the Lord's house should be estab- 
lished in the top of the mountain and all nations 
should flow into it; when the law of the Lord 



Election in Sanctification. 79 

should go forth out of Zion and the word of the 
Lord from Jerusalem. That day has come, and 
the Gospel is now the power of God unto salva- 
tion to every one that believeth, to the Jew first 
and also to the Gentile. Therein is the righteous- 
ness of God revealed from faith to faith. The 
light which first broke upon the hill-tops through 
a divine] y chosen and inspired few is now shin- 
lug unto us to give us the light of the knowledge 
of the glory of God as it shines in the face of 
Jesus Christ. 

All believers are elect, but all believers have 
not been eternally elected, neither have all been 
elected unconditionally. Of the Gentile believ- 
ers Paul in 2 Thess. 2:13 says: "God hath from 
a beginning chosen you to salvation in sanctifi- 
cation of spirit and belief of truth." Peter, 
writing to Gentile believers, addresses them as 
"Elect according to the foreknowledge of God 
the Father, in sanctification of spirit unto obedi- 
ence and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. " 

God had a perfect foreknowledge of his multi- 
form plan of the ages, and now, according to 
that foreknowledge, those who hear the Gospel 
and believe are elected in sanctification of spirit 
and belief of truth, and sprinkling of the blood 
of Jesus Christ." 

The process of sanctifying the spiritual na- 
ture of men and the conditions which it in- 



80 The Trend of the Ages. 

volved, as well as the means under the Spirit 
dispensation, were as definitely foreknown as 
were the individuals who were personally fore- 
known and arbitrarily saved under the former 
dispensation. Under the old dispensation it 
was the Father dealing with his Son with refer- 
ence to those whom he had given him. Now it 
is the Father and the Son dealing with all men 
through them. Thus God says to men every- 
where, "Give diligence to make your calling and 
election sure.' 

Here is an election to be made sure. They 
were not exhorted merely to assure themselves 
of the fact that they had been eternally elected 
to salvation, but to make their election itself 
sure. It is not necessary to say that no one will 
be saved except those who have added all the 
Christian graces mentioned in the foregoing 
verses. It is only necessary to say that when 
they are added their election is as sure as those 
who were eternally elected. It is not necessary 
to say, either, that when the election of these is 
made sure they are possessed of every attribute 
of character and inspiration bestowed on first- 
born ones. It is only necessary to say that 
whatever in the character of the eternally elect 
which was essential to their salvation is be- 
stowed on us in our election in sanctification of 
spirit and belief of truth. 



Election in Sanctification. 81 

Conditional election is just as sure and just as 
complete when we comply with the requirements 
as if it had been eternal and unconditional. 
Here the divine government rests securely when 
tested by reason. No man can complain of the 
uncertainty of his election when he can make it 
as sure as an eternal decree. A thing is often 
less certain by being placed within the range of 
secondary causes, but it is not less sure when 
secured through a secondary cause. The man 
into whom God breathed the breath of life was 
no more conscious of living than he who is born 
of a woman. Neither were the church of first- 
born ones more conscious of their election and 
consequent acceptance than we may be of our 
acceptance and consequent election. It is not 
that which is antecedent which satisfies the hun- 
ger of the soul and fills one with the peace of 
God, but the conscious ability to say: "I know 
that my Redeemer liveth." If I can trim the 
pencil with which I write as well with a pen- 
knife, why should I wish it done in the factory? 
If what God requires will make my election as 
sure and make me as conscious of it as an eter- 
nal decree, what else but selfishness and indo- 
lence makes me praise him more for a decree? 
Here is the point of the inspired apostolic ex- 
hortation. God is bringing a world up from in- 
fancy into the conscious activity of real freedom. 



82 The Trend of the Ages. 

We have illustrated to us his Fatherhood and his 
reign, and now the elective franchise and also 
the official relation of priest and king is placed 
at our disposal with specific directions given. 
Thus we are urged to give diligence, and if only 
by accepting it as a free gift show ourselves 
worthy of his grace. 

Thus aliens are no more strangers to the com- 
monwealth of Israel and to the covenant of 
promise, but fellow-citizens with the saints and 
of the household of God. And ye who were 
sometime afar off are made nigh by the blood of 
Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made 
both one and broken down the middle wall of 
partition between us. 



Christ at the Very Door. 83 



CHAPTER XI. 

CHRIST AT THE VERY DOOR. 

"Behold I stand at the door and knock. If any man 
hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him 
and will sup with him and he with me." 

Every problem of life and of religion is in- 
volved in the fact that life has impinged upon 
matter and assumed material form. The philos- 
ophy of mind at once ceases to be wholly meta- 
physical and the kingdom of heaven becomes 
largely cosmogonal. Within the cosmic en- 
closure, and apart from the pure world of mind, 
we think, feel, and have a being. Within this 
being of feeling and thought there are limitless 
possibilities of joy or pain. 

We may make it the habitation of every vile 
and unclean thing, or it may be made the ban- 
queting house of the King of Saints. Within, 
and not without, is the scene of life's real strug- 
gles. Here is the storm-center and the battle- 
ground of the ages, and of every living soul. 
Here, also, is the scene of all victory and the 
treasure-house of all trophies, the seat of judg- 
ment and the palace built for the coronation day. 
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God." 



84 The Trend of the Ages. 

"Behold I will send my messenger, and he shall 
prepare the way for me; and the Lord, whom ye 
seek, shall suddenly come to his temple. " He is 
cosmothetic, but in one respect he is like unto 
us, in the world only when within the cosmic 
enclosure of personal thought, feeling, and be- 
ing. ' 'For he worketh in us both to will and to 
do." "Behold I stand at the door and knock." 

To the earthly temple of conscious being there 
is but one door. The five senses may be as 
many avenues leading to it, but there is only one 
door to the real house. At that door whatever 
would enter must knock for admittance. Here 
the armies of heaven halt in their hitherto tri- 
umphant march and acknowledge the power of 
a human soul to remain in darkness for ever. 
And here the divine one yields to the right of 
free personal choice. This right has never been 
denied nor taken from one of earth's sorrowing 
millions, and can never be till life ceases to be 
personal. 

There were an hundred and forty and four 
thousand Jews who constituted the number of 
the elect. But they were created in Christ 
Jesus unto good works which God before or- 
dained that they should walk in them. They 
were the elder son who was ever with the Father. 
They were as virgins, and followed the Lamb 
whithersoever he went. They were first-borns 



Christ at the Very Door. 85 

according to the election of grace. The plan of 
free grace involved their salvation before they 
were created, that in them God might illustrate 
the value of offered mercy. Thus the citadel of 
life has been compassed with a cloud of wit- 
nesses in the fullness of the dispensation of 
times. These, from whom no right of choice 
had ever been taken away, because never given, 
now walk, with their inspired example, through 
the avenues of sense while Christ stands at the 
very door and knocks for admittance. 

When the door is opened Christ will enter into 
the soul, and with the soul into the sweetest and 
most intimate fellowship. When the United 
States government entered into Cuba by arbi- 
trary power the very best she could do was to 
give the Cubans an example of free government. 
The government must enter into the souls of the 
Cubans themselves before they can know the 
sweets of American freedom. By a predestined 
plan and by arbitrary power Christ's government 
has entered into the world. But if aliens from 
the Commonwealth of Israel and the covenants 
of promise would know him and the power of 
his resurrection, if they would know the kingdom 
of God, which is righteousness, joy, and peace 
in the Holy Ghost, he must enter into them. 

Here is God's cosmic kingdom in its last analy- 
sis. It is Christianity individualized, when as 



86 The Trend of the Ages. 

an experiment it has crystallized in one's own 
being of feeling and thought. It is Pentecost 
reproduced within the limits of a single person, 
and the lifting of his horizon to the measure of 
the infinite. "I will sup with him and he with 
me." An age of free grace has brought the 
banquet after the marriage supper, while heav- 
en's sovereign power waits upon human volition 
and each sit together in sweetest fellowship and 
communion. 

Life no longer depends now upon material 
form, upon which it first impinged and became 
conscious of cosmic existence. "For to know 
God is eternal life, and Jesus Christ whom he 
hath sent." The life which was cosmic now be- 
comes cosmothetic by reason of an indwelling 
Christ. 

That which ruled us through a sense of fear 
is now ruled by us, and we become heirs to an 
inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that 
fadeth not away. Whether Paul, or Apollos, or 
Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things 
present, or things to come, all are yours, and ye 
are Christ's and Christ is God's. 

That which in the ages of arbitrary election 
and predestination opened a highway to the soul 
of humanity has in an age of free grace made 
the individual conscious of the fact that he is 
the door-keeper to his own inner self. And 



Christ at the Very Door, 87 

while shut up in darkness till born again one 
may hear a voice which speaks to him. The 
voice is not of himself, but speaks from without. 
It appeals to his thirst for a higher communion 
and to his desire for a heavenly light. In his 
own will and in the darkness of his own little 
home he must decide for himself. He who speaks 
is responsible for what he proposes. He who 
hears is responsible for how he decides. What 
an hour and what a vision of beauty when the 
psychic consciousness of an earthly being obeys 
the voice of this divine visitor who comes to 
abide. 

They shall sit together in the heavenly places 
and sup together from the very fountain of 
knowledge. The soul which groped in the dark- 
ness of its material home, which it loved because 
it knew no other, now learns from its author 
from whence it came and whither it shall return. 
It is the victory by faith of mind over matter 
when one learns that man shall not live by bread 
alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of 
the mouth of God. 



88 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE HOLY SPIRIT REVEALING THE CHRIST. 

"He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of mine, and 
shall show it unto you." Jno. 16:14. 

As the manifestation of Jesus is the spirit of 
prophecy, so the manifestation of the Christ to 
and in the disciples of Jesus is the work of the 
Holy Spirit when sent into the world as a per- 
sonal agent of the enthroned son of Mary. Hu- 
manity is now exalted legally, having impinged 
upon the throne of power in the form of the 
risen Christ, and the cause of humanity assumes 
imperial form. The government of heaven as 
established on earth, and called the kingdom of 
heaven, fosters a oneness of that government in 
heaven and earth, and in this it seeks to identify 
redeemed humanity on earth with enthroned hu- 
manity above. The Holy Spirit is the essential 
as well as the personal agent through which and 
through whom the assimilation of likeness is now 
going on. 

As a distinct person in the world the Holy 
Spirit only knows his work. He is apart from 
the government except to do the will of Christ. 



The Holy Spirit Revealing the Christ 89 

In dealing with men he does not speak of him- 
self, nor does he seek to reveal himself in any 
sense. He is as much subject to the enthroned 
humanity as the humanity was subject to him 
when Jesus cast out devils by the Holy Ghost. 
There has been a literal transfer to him who rose 
from the dead of all authority in heaven and 
earth, and he who commands us to preach the 
Gospel to all nations commands the Spirit also. 

The Holy Spirit has no authority now beyond 
what is delegated to him. Our appeal is to the 
Christ, and every mercy to us should be accept- 
ed as if directly from him. It is his authority 
and his character that clothes the work of the 
Holy Spirit just as it is to affect us when we 
profit by it. The Spirit does the work, but there 
is nothing of himself in what he does. That 
spirit which exalts the third person is another, 
and is anti- Christ. 

"He that hath my commandments and keepeth 
them, he it is that loveth me; and he that loveth 
me shall be loved of my Father and I will mani- 
fest myself unto him." Following this is the 
promise of the Comforter, who was to cause 
them to remember the words of Christ. The 
Holy Spirit does not make us forgetful of the 
words and will of Christ and drive us headlong 
into a frenzied worship of the third person. The 
silent flow of the sap in the tree does not attract 



90 The Trend of the Ages. 

our attention from the fruit on the branches, nor 
from the root of the matter. It simply takes the 
substance from the root and silently conveys it 
to the branches where the fruit appears. We 
make no appeal to the sap in the tree for fruit. 
We cultivate, rather, our familiarity with Mother 
Earth. Many a fair tree in the garden of earth 
has been blighted by tinkering with the silent 
forces of nature. 

The Holy Spirit in the individual is much like 
revealed religion in the world. He is not reveal- 
ing himself and explaining his work as he goes. 
His work is like that of a terminal inflorescence. 
It blossoms first at the apex, and then back to 
the base of the stem. "Thou knowest not now, 
but thou shalt know hereafter, " is organic in the 
very constitution of the kingdom of heaven. 
Herein is the philosophy of faith in Christ. And 
this is the harmony between the development of 
the Christ character in the individual and the 
development of the Christ government in the 
world. The internal assimilation of the Christ 
character effects his world government and de- 
termines our adaptation to it in form. Thus Paul 
says: "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless 
I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the 
life that I now live in the flesh I live by the faith 
of the Son of God, who loved me and gave him- 
self for me." 



The Holy Spirit Revealing the Christ. 91 

The office work of the Holy Spirit in and 
through the disciples of Jesus is but a divine in- 
cident in the trend of the ages. Its purpose is 
to glorify the Christ on the earth. It means the 
triumph of the Christ character in all the rela- 
tions of life, and the final triumph, therefore, of 
mind over matter. Men are born of the Spirit 
into a spiritual kingdom that they may be sus- 
ceptible to the impressions of the world of pure 
mind which are to effect the world's redemption, 
when it shall no longer be subject to law, but to. 
life. These impressions are conveyed to us 
through the image of the Christ character. 
The attention of the disciple is fixed upon the 
attributes of his character as imaged in the life. 
of the Son of Man, and not upon the Holy Spirit, 
who is only the silent and invisible agent, though 
active in the process. The emotions produced 
in the disciple by the Holy Spirit in performing 
his office work are incidental, and while he thus 
becomes to us the promised Comforter, these 
emotions are not to be our controlling desire. 

As disciples of Christ we are to be made like 
him, whether in sorrow or joy. "If any man 
will come after me let him deny himself and take 
up his cross and follow me." In the transforma- 
tion of character the will of the believer and the 
Holy Spirit are both subject to the Christ. 

There is no example of praying to the Holy 



92 The Trend of tlte Ages. 

Spirit nor for the Holy Spirit given in the his- 
tory of the early disciples, and the practice of it 
hinders rather than promotes his work in and 
through us. Christ knows what he wants done 
in us and how he wants it done. The promise of 
the Holy Spirit is given to assure us of the cer- 
tainty, and the divine nature of the comfort and 
help we are to receive from him, and he prom- 
ised that he would pray for the Spirit to be sent. 
It is the same Spirit manifest in the trend of the 
ages and directing the course of events in the 
development of the kingdom of God, and fore- 
shadowing the age following the advent of the 
Son of Man. He is now imminent in the life of 
every one who is loyal to the Christ. And it is 
this divine imminence which is disclosing more 
and more of the Christ character and thus pro- 
claims the golden age to come when Christ shall 
be all and in all. 

The chief desire of the disciple is to be like 
his Master, and the chief work of the Holy 
Spirit is to glorify Christ. Hence, it is said: 
"He shall receive of mine and shall show it unto 
you." He teaches us what to pray for, not by 
speaking of himself, but by showing us what he 
has received of Christ. "He shall not speak of 
himself, but what he shall hear that shall he 
speak." Prayer may be made to the Father in 
Christ's name for anything, with the assurance 



The Holy Spirit Revealing the Christ. 93 

that whatsoever it be the Father will give it. 
If we are loyal to the name of Christ, the Father 
will send it by the Spirit, but let us remember 
that the Holy Spirit is the agent of the Father 
and the Son. He is their agent, to do their will 
mechanically in us without reference to our 
thought of him at the time, and the things which 
he shows us fixes our minds and hearts more and 
more upon the Saviour whose image we are to 
bear. 

Our minds shall be more and more enlight- 
ened, not only as to this fact, but also as to the 
character of him into whose likeness we are be- 
ing fashioned. We shall be like him when we 
shall see him as he is, and this shall be when the 
Holy Spirit has completed his work in us. We 
shall grow in graciousness as we grow in the 
knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
Heaven is coming earthward as we are growing 
heavenward, and the time shall come when the 
knowledge of Christ shall fill the earth as the 
waters cover the sea. 

4 'We ourselves groan within ourselves waiting 
for the adoption, to- wit, the redemption of our 
bodies," but that knowledge shall be with power 
when he shall quicken our mortal bodies by his 
Spirit that dwelleth in us. 

"The creature was made subject to vanity, not 
willingly, but by reason of him who hath sub- 



'94 The Trend of the Ages. 

jected the same in hope." Hence, "the earnest 
expectation of the creature waiteth for the mani- 
festation of the sons of God. " ■ 'For the creature 
itself also shall be delivered from the bondage 
of corruption into the glorious liberty of the 
children of God." 

As sure as there is a place where the spirits of 
the just are made perfect, and as sure as the be- 
liever is thus perfected by an entrance into that 
place through the portals of death where he 
gains a perfect knowledge of Christ, so sure will 
human life be perfected here when the Christ 
has been fully shown to men by the Spirit, and 
the knowledge of Christ shall fill the earth. 
Knowledge is power, and he said: "All power is 
given unto me in heaven and earth." Power is 
what he promised by the Holy Spirit. He shall 
receive of mine, of my power, and show it unto 
you. "But ye shall receive power, after that the 
Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be 
witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all 
Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost 
parts of the earth." 

The apostolic witnessing will extend to the 
uttermost parts of the earth, and it will be with 
apostolic power. This power will become resi- 
dent and natural in the believer as the world be- 
comes familiar with its nature, character, and 
purpose through the office of the Spirit. It will 



The Holy Spirit Revealing the Christ. 95 

bring the time when we shall know as we are 
known. Then we shall be like him, for we shall 
see him as he is. 



96 The Trend of the Ages. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

HUMAN FREEDOM HERE ON EARTH. 

Is absolute freedom obtainable only in the 
spirit world, or is the hope held out in the Gos- 
pel to the world that now is? That we have not 
yet attained to the fulfillment of God's earthly 
purpose is evident, and, since the universal 
trend has been away from the arbitrary, the 
miraculous, and the predetermination of things 
for man towards the determination of things by 
the human mind and will, we may safely con- 
clude that his ultimate purpose of earth's re- 
demption involves an age of absolute freedom. 

Revealed religion is not organization merely, 
but a movement upon organized matter and 
forces towards a great end. The religion of the 
Bible finds man a psychophysical being. In this 
is found the necessity and the possibility of gen- 
uine religion. The soul is "entangled in the 
meshes of vicious cosmogonic consciousness and 
fettered by the appetites and laws of physical 
want and desire. Religion is not merely cosmo- 
thetic. 

While it seeks to regulate the life that now is, 
it promises the redemption of the soul from its 



Human Freedom Here On Earth. 97 

subordinate relation to the material form in 
which it has been enslaved. 

It is not liberty merely which is promised in 
the Gospel, but absolute freedom, "If the Son 
make you free ye shall be free indeed." It is 
the freedom of the victor, and not merely the 
liberty of one released. 

Our bodies are the temples of God, and we, 
his children, are to be given the freedom of the 
temple. Those who have yielded themselves 
unto God in the trial of their faith will now find 
their members subject unto them as instruments 
of righteousness. 

We are now living in an age of constraint 
when the Gospel is the power of God. We are 
removed by the advance of God's multiform plan 
away from the age of arbitrary miracle and legal 
restraint to where the historical interpretation 
becomes prophetic. As the hundred and forty 
and four thousand on Mount Zion were prophetic 
of an innumerable company of bloodwashed, so 
the liberty of the children of God into which we 
are called by the constraining power of the Gos- 
pel is prophetic of a golden age of absolute 
freedom. How far one may conquer by keeping 
the body under now may not be evenly deter- 
mined in the experience of all Christians; but 
as sure as the Gospel has brought an age of lib- 
erty, so surely will the Spirit bring an age of 



98 The Trend of the Ages. 

absolute freedom. The ages of miracle and 
legal restraint prepared the world for an age of 
Gospel constraint and what is called the right of 
choice; and this will bring the age when men 
shall be free. 

Absolute freedom in this psychomaterialism 
must be freedom of soul, mind, and body. The 
soul must be free from sin. The mind must be 
free from fear, and the body must be free from 
destruction. As long as the soul is hampered 
by positive laws of overt action in the gov- 
ernment of the body and life, whether by re- 
straint or constraint, it is not free. The time 
must come when the power involving the right 
of choice is resident in the soul. As long as the 
mind is fettered by fear, whether as to the de- 
termination of the will and its moral account- 
ability, or as to the overt acts of the body 
involving the physical appearance of danger, it 
cannot be free. The time must come when the 
right of choice in harmony with the soul's desire 
will involve no sense of accountability, and when 
the position of the body will produce no thought 
of danger. 

As long as the body is subject to the laws of 
material being it cannot be free. The time must 
come when it is subject not to law, but to life. 
Soul, mind, and body must be made harmonious 
in the one experience that man lives not by 



Human Freedom Here On Earth. 99 

bread, but by the Word which proceedeth out of 
the mouth of God. Thus the ego is in the 
spirit; and thus men will live in the spirit and 
walk in the spirit, and not in the flesh. This is 
the ideal of personal religion, and as individuals 
have experimental foretastes of what is in re- 
serve for them, so the world has had historical 
foretastes of what is promised in the golden age 
to come. Herein is a world-wide application of 
the statement: "That was not first which was 
spiritual, but that which is natural; and after- 
ward that which is spiritual." 

The battle is on, and the psychophysical be- 
ing of man is the scene of what seems to be 
a deadly strife, but while the old man shall be 
crucified with his deeds the body shall not be 
destroyed. God in his manifold wisdom is deal- 
ing with the problem of life impinged upon mat- 
ter, and the success of each dispensation of the 
past is a renewed promise of victory for his ulti- 
mate purpose in the final and absolute freedom 
of life in man. Sin has abounded by the law 
that it might appear sin. Sin has been washed 
away by the blood of Christ, and now we look 
for a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwell- 
eth righteousness. The love of God is being 
perfected in us by the Gospel, which is the con- 
straining power of God, and fear is being cast 

out. And the time is coming when the stars that 
l.ofC- 



100 The Trend of the Ages. 

hold their festivals around the midnight throne 
and mock us with their unapproachable glory 
shall be spread out before us like the islands that 
slumber in the sea. 

Psychic consciousness which has so long felt 
after God has found him working in us to will 
and to do, and the hand that is now reaching out 
with feelings of uncertainty through the mist of 
material problems will soon master our earthly 
situation. The trees which have grown only in 
the streets of Paradise will then flourish on both 
shores of the River of Life; and its leaves will 
heal the nations who were driven from it in our 
federal head. That which is natural shall have 
passed away when that which is spiritual is 
come, and then shall Simon Peter walk the sea 
without fear of wind or wave. 



Prophecy in Experience of Holiness. 101 



CHAPTER XIV. 

PROPHECY IN EXPERIENCE OF HOLINESS. 

Holiness is experienced by whomsoever it is 
possessed. Sometimes the experience partakes 
of the historical character of Christ, its author 
and source. Sometimes it is of the present only, 
and partakes only of the cleansing efficacy of his 
blood through the direct agency of the Holy 
Spirit. Sometimes it partakes of both, and be- 
comes prophetic of what humanity shall be in 
the earth's golden age to come. The position of 
some that perfect or complete holiness is the 
normal experience made possible from Pentecost 
on is a fallacy. That was the world's historical 
foretaste in approximate type. As a prophecy 
of what is to be, this type has entered into the 
hopes and aspirations of believers, and is trans- 
muted into a real experience. 

This real experience is a personal foretaste of 
that given historically to the world at Pentecost, 
and is a sure word of prophecy to which we do 
well to take heed as unto a light which shineth 
in a dark place. But let us remember that while 
it is a real light it shineth as yet only in a dark 



102 The Trend of the Ages. 

place. "When that which is perfect is come, 
that which is in part shall be done away." 

Of all the inspired writers, Paul has said most 
of holiness, and we take it largely as an index to 
his experience. But in this, as in other things, 
we must rightly divide the word of truth if we 
would know the real truth as it is in Christ. If 
we fail to do this we will find Paul's experience 
as contradictory as predestination and free grace 
when applied to the same people and time. 

Let us keep in mind that God's dealings with 
the race has been dispensational in the progress 
of one great movement. Wherever the border 
line of a dispensation has been visible, it is 
marked by miraculous displays of arbitrary 
power. And while the movement is one in its 
trend towards one great end, its dispensational 
character is outlined in the cosmothetic experi- 
ences of the individual. Thus it will be easy to 
separate the tangled web of Paul's experience; 
and then, with the prophetic eye of our own 
partial and prophetic holiness we shall behold 
the glory which is promised in the golden age 
to come. 

There are three distinct types of holiness out- 
lined in the experience of Paul, as there are 
three distinct dispensations in the cosmothetic 
movement of the kingdom of heaven. Accord- 
ing to the law, by which no man could be justi- 



Prophecy in Experience of Holiness. 103 

fied, and which was given that sin might abound, 
or appear sin, he saw himself blameless, and in 
all good conscience towards God; but in which, 
having crossed the dispensational line, he felt 
himself the chief of sinners. As a believer, 
keeping the old man under, he struggles with 
psychophysical consciousness, and cries, "Oh 
wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me 
from this body of death. But as a child of hope, 
having felt the power of Christ's risen life, which 
foretells an age of perfect freedom, he breaks 
forth in actual triumph, saying: "Thanks be to 
God who giveth us the victory through our Lord 
Jesus Christ." I have seen Christians living in 
first one and then the other of these dispensa- 
tional phases of Christian experience, and I have 
no hesitancy in saying that Christ means for us 
to make the latter our religious habit until man- 
ifesting the divinest optimism it will impinge 
upon the social order of things as an house not 
made with hands. 

The prophetic experiences through which the 
Holy Spirit is now carrying us towards the con- 
summation of the ages are both psychic and cos- 
mic, both metaphysical and physiological, and 
they will be until mind has completely and eter- 
nally triumphed over material form. 

But while the victory of the soul in Christ is 
certain, the war is real, and the experiences of 



104 The Trend of the Ages. 

those in the struggle are real. One pressed by 
the common foe into a backslidden life will ex- 
perience the fear and forebodings of one under a 
dispensation of law with its curse hanging over 
him. One grappling with the problems of faith 
and courageously battling for the right in 
Christ's name will feel that he is keeping the old 
man under. While sometimes in moments or 
days of ecstasy one hardly knows whether he is 
in the body or out of the body. 

Some time we shall be able to decide this ques- 
tion intelligently and know that we are in the 
body without the experience of recurring war- 
fare with it. Humanity will some day get its 
bearings on the heights of Pisgah without re- 
turning any more to the Valley of Jehosephat; 
for the final victory for personal and experi- 
mental holiness shall be contemporaneous with 
the visible triumph of the kingdom of God. 

The signs of our times are pointing in that di- 
rection as never before, and the history of a day 
is big with prophecy of the golden morrow. 
The diatribe of nations is loaded with dynamite, 
and above the moan of the ocean's surge the 
crash of arms speaks in the thunder tones of the 
cannon's mouth which tells of Armageddon. But 
the dynamic force which has given the world its 
trend towards the final triumph of holiness is the 
Christ Almighty. 



Prophecy in Experience of Holiness. 105 

And through him the silent forces of nature 
are organizing more and more. Men and women 
are feeling more and more that he who revealed 
himself in breaking bread, and then vanished, 
will soon be the manifest bread of life. The ex- 
periences of holy communion with the Christ are 
already in many places manifesting him who 
bore our sicknesses, and who healeth our dis- 
eases. Spurgeon, and Moody, and Gordon, and 
Simpson, and many others, have given the 
world glimpses of a new world wherein dwelleth 
righteousness and the heart-beat of time brings 
us nigh unto the golden day. 

With mobs, and riot, and anarchy, and strikes, 
and threatenings on the one hand, and a mighty 
hungering, and thirsting, and reading the Word 
of God anew on the other, men are everywhere 
panting for freedom. Some are still grappling 
with legal ideas of reform and groaning under 
burdens intolerable to be borne. But there is a 
rapidly growing number who are climbing the 
heights of experimental holiness, where they 
will stand with calm assurance in the sunlight 
which already breaks upon the hill-tops while 
the cloud-burst threatens those in the valley be- 
low. 

To Paul these heights of experience were as 
real as if the day of God had come, and as an 
inspired man he spoke of them accurately, but 



106 The Trend of the Ayes. 

speaking as for himself alone he shows by other 
experiences that he had not arrived at a perma- 
nent state of perfect holiness. We are right in 
taking any one of Paul's expressions of his own 
experience as the ground of a doctrinal proposi- 
tion, but we must not apply that doctrinal prop- 
osition too broadly as covering the whole of our 
dispensation. They are all dispensational; but 
they involve the nature of all the dispensations 
of revealed religion, as the whole of a great 
movement involves all of its parts. So have 
the experiences of Christians since; only that we 
are again approximating the heights of apostolic 
joy. The prophetic song of apostolic thanks- 
giving has been projected through the centuries 
and is beginning to break forth in the acclaim of 
a world-wide redemption. 



He Is Coming and Will Come. 107 



CHAPTER XV. 

HE IS COMING AND WILL, COME. 

The final coming of the Christ is vouchedsaf e 
to us in a more sure word of prophecy; where- 
unto we do well to take heed as unto a light that 
shineth in a dark place. For God, who com- 
mandeth the light to shine out of darkness, hath 
shined in our hearts to give the light of the 
knowledge of glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ. 

If the religion of Christ meant organization 
merely, and the church a band of people looking 
for the personal appearance of the Saviour, it 
would be of far less consequence to the social 
order of things than it is. World-wide evangel- 
ization means the reign of the Christ in the social 
relations of this world. He has come once in the 
fleshly form of a person to put away sin by the 
sacrifice of himself, thus securing to men the 
power of his risen life through the eternal 
Spirit. Now the Lord is that Spirit; a-nd where 
the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. ' 'And 
we all with open face, beholding as in a glass 
the glory of the Lord, are changed into the 



108 The Trend of the Ages. 

same image from glory to glory by the Spirit of 
the Lord." 

Religion is a great spiritual movement upon 
the world's social order, and as it impinges more 
and more upon the social nature of the individual 
soul, it brings the Christ more and more into the 
relations of life. All shall be changed into the 
same image till the light that appeareth in the 
East shall shine even unto the West. It is to 
give the light of the knowledge of the glory of 
God in the face of Jesus Christ, and this knowl- 
edge is to fill the earth as the waters fill the sea. 

The broader hope for this world as set out in 
the Gospel is to know and recognize the Christ 
in the relations of life as we know his forgive- 
ness and helpfulness within. That men may 
attain unto this perfection is to apprehend that 
for which they are apprehended of Jesus Christ. 
This is the prize of our high calling for which 
we press towards the mark. 

This simply means that Christ is sometime to 
be our life-sphere. He is to come in every rela- 
tion of life and displace the old with the new. 
When the world shall know him and the power 
of his resurrection, he will be the soul of society 
as certainly as he is now the life of individual 
character. As individuals put on the new man 
which is renewed in knowledge after the image 
of Christ, the social relations of Greek and Jew 



He Is Coming and Will Gome. 109* 

will become the world-wide re-incarnation and 
Christ will be all and in all. 

Thus Christ has been coming through the ages, 
and thus he will continue to come until he shall 
fill the earth with his manifest presence and 
power. "In him was life, and the life was the 
light of men. That was the true light that light- 
eth every man that cometh into the world. " That 
light hath shined into our hearts to give us a 
knowledge of the glory of God. This light is 
resident in the believer, because Christ liveth in 
us. When men shall mortify their members 
which are upon the earth and put on the new 
man renewed in knowledge, then in all the rela- 
tions of life Christ who is our life shall appear 
and we shall appear with him in glory. 

If the manifestation of Jesus was the spirit of 
prophecy, the manifestations of the Christ in 
the social relations of life will be the crowning 
glory of the Son of Mary. It means the coming 
of a time when God's ultimate purpose of human 
freedom shall have reached all the avenues of 
human intercourse and subordinated all the rules 
of earthly government to the sanctified will of a 
redeemed race in whom Christ is all and all. 

In that day ye shall ask what ye will and it 
shall be done unto you. Now we ask and receive 
not, because we ask amiss, but in that age no 
man will ask amiss. We are taught now to imi- 



110 The Trend of the Ages. 

tate in Christ's name what shall be universally 
realized in that day. "Give to him that asketh 
thee, and from him that would borrow of thee 
turn not away." 

The channels of commerce and the avenues of 
trade are to be swayed and changed by the emi- 
nence and power of the coming Christ. The 
Christ life and character will materialize in the 
broadest agrarianism. Capital and labor will be 
on equal terms when Christ shall come in the 
social order and there will be no trespass. Men 
will have learned that it is more blessed to give 
than it is to receive and there will be no want. 
He that humbleth himself sha'l then be exalted, 
and the will of God will be done on earth as nat- 
urally, and in the freedom of choice, as it is now 
done by angels in heaven. 

The realizations of the golden age to come are 
outlined in the psychological experiences of the 
best Christians to-day just as surely as our times 
were foretold in the prophecies of those who 
reached the summits of their dispensation and 
time. 

The Christ was coming then, and the Christ is 
coming now. The apostles were inspired as 
were the prophets of old, and their prophecies 
accord with the aspirations and tendencies of 
spiritual disposition experienced under the con- 
straining power of God through the Gospel and 



He Is Coming and Will Come. Ill 

by the Holy Spirit. These personal ecstatic ex- 
periences of aspiring hope are to us a sure word 
of prophecy which shineth out in the relations 
of life, and they will shine more and more unto 
the perfect day. 

Wickedness among the wicked will wax worse 
and worse as the sham and show of legalism 
fostered the wickedness of Pharisaical hate at 
the close of the old dispensation. But with an 
increasing number in prophetic touch with the 
source and fountain of light, the consummation 
of the day of his coming will in the diatribe of 
nations and the revolution of kindreds and peo- 
ples leap upon the world as a thief in the night. 
This essential coming of the Christ will be the 
crown of his personal appearance in that day, 
and this is the substance of the world's hope to- 
day. 

Jesus of Nazareth was the ideal man, but the 
best of his followers could not then see him as 
he is. "But when he shall appear we shall be 
like him, for we shall see him as he is." The 
reason why it did not then appear what we shall 
be was that their psychic vision was holden by 
the laws of physical necessity so that they could 
not see him as he is, guiding the kingdom of 
heaven as a movement that cometh not by ob- 
servation. But when we are made free from the 
laws of physical necessity by the substantial 



112 The Trend of the Ages. 

coming of the Christ, and the relations of life 
have been corrected by an age of trusting him, 
our line of spiritual vision will be broadened by 
what we are in him to see him as he really is. 
Then at his appearance we shall see that we are 
like him. Then shall we know as we are known, 
and he will say to us as he said to John when he 
saw it afar off: "It is done. I am Alpha and 
Omega, the beginning and the end." 



Jan - 8 1901 



DEC 31 1900 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: April 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



- fel<\^o 



